Pakistan to Build New Nuclear Plant

Paraphrased by
Steve Waldrop
May 5, 2004

Pakistan is receiving help from China to build a new nuclear power plant in the north of the country, the long-time allies recently announced.

The new 300-megawatt power station will be located next to a plant the Chinese helped to build in the 1990s, also at Chashma, on the banks of the River Indus. The power plant should be completed by 2010, and will be for peaceful purposes, according to officials.

It is the second nuclear plant that China has helped Pakistan construct, and comes after a Pakistani scientist confessed to leaking nuclear secrets. Earlier this year, Pakistan's best-known nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan, sent shock waves through the nation when he went on television and confessed to leaking nuclear secrets to countries such as North Korea, Libya and Iran.

To calm fears, the government of Pakistan is stressing the new plant will follow International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards.

Representatives from the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission and the China National Nuclear Corporation signed the contract, estimated to be worth $600 million.

"It is worth mentioning that Pakistan's nuclear power plants are under the safeguards of the IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency, which is... responsible for monitoring and safeguarding of nuclear power plants," a statement issued by both parties said.

Sources say that since Pakistan is not a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, its weapons program is not open to international inspections.

Pakistan's first nuclear power plant was built in 1972 in Karachi with Canadian assistance.