The sentence they received was the maximum possible under Russian law. Russia has repeatedly accused elements in Turkey of supporting the Chechen rebels. Aleksei Yablokov, head of the Ecological Safety Commission of the Russian Security Council, told a Moscow press conference on 15 April that the controversial Russo-Iranian deal to finish the uncompleted nuclear power station at Bushehr could give Iran access to technology that would allow it to build nuclear weapons, Russian and Western agencies reported. A plant there will reprocess up to 10,000 tons of heptyl, much of it removed from deactivated Russian ballistic missiles, at a new facility there, constructed with U.S. assistance under the Nunn-Lugar program. Vasilli Goncharov, the mayor of the town, told NTV that hundreds of local residents had signed petitions opposing the plant, citing fears of environmental damage.
Residents also object to what they claim are plans to import foreign heptyl for processing.
Genrykh Matysyak, director of the plant, said only Russian heptyl will be processed there and argued that the facility will boost the local economy by creating new jobs. Tensions have been high along the Demilitarized Zone separating the two Koreas since Pyongyang renounced the 1953 armistice agreement earlier this month. Backtracking from earlier statements, Ignatenko also acknowledged that no progress had been made on settling North Korea's debts to the former USSR, valued at over 3 billion transferable rubles, which Russia inherited in 1991. The New York Times reported on 16 April. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Krylov delivered a formal protest to Estonian Ambassador Mart Helme on 12 April, complaining that authorities in the Estonian border city of Narva had cut off water supplies to the neighboring Russian town of Ivangorod, ITAR-TASS reported.