The governments of these countries have their own policies regarding the management of their economy, their energy sector and, specifically, the upgrading or closure of their reactors. In this context, a nuclear safety strategy was adopted by the international community at the G7 summit in Munich 1992. In addition to the G7 strategy, the IAEA classified the problems associated with the design and operation of all types of Soviet-designed reactors in four categories according to their seriousness. The role of the EU As nuclear safety in Europe is one of EU s primary concerns, the EU decided to take a prominent role in international efforts to help the NIS and countries of central and eastern Europe to ensure the safety of their nuclear reactors. The Member States charged the European Commission with this responsibility.
Nuclear safety is a major part of the enlargement process.
The candidate countries are fully aware of the importance that the EU attaches to this subject and have demonstrated their readiness to tackle the international community s concerns. In addition, the EU s strategy for the NIS reflects the differences among the NIS themselves. Implementation of the Phare and Tacis nuclear safety programmes To implement the EU s strategy for improving nuclear safety in Central Europe and the NIS, the Commission developed a Master Plan a method of evaluation in 12 key practical safety areas, in line with the IAEA risk classification. With respect to the immediate future, it is considered that actions could be strengthened in a number of areas in order to improve their effectiveness, taking into account the achievements and difficulties of the nuclear safety programmes to date. For PDF files, a free viewer is downloadable on the Adobe Systems' World Wide Website.