Putin- Erdogan meeting focuses on nuclear joint venture

The meeting between Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in Ankara on Thursday focused on a strategic nuclear joint project, according to a local expert.

Issues around the Russia-financed Akkuyu Nuclear Power Plant and the planned Turkish Stream natural gas pipeline from Russia to Turkey were on top of the agenda during Erdogan's talks with Putin, Aydin Sezer, head of the Turkish-Russian Research Center, told Xinhua.

"We expect to build and launch Unit One of the Akkuyu Nuclear Power Plant within a shorter timeframe," Putin said at a press conference Thursday after his meeting with Erdogan.

"The Turkish side has not taken required steps in terms of financial and approval issues for a 22.5-billion-U.S.-dollar project after seven years. The Russian side is very much concerned about this. They have brought nearly 3 billion dollars of direct investment to Turkey for the project in 2015," said Sezer.

Turkey's atomic energy authority has not given building permits for the Akkuyu project since March when Russians applied to the authority, he explained.

Turkey has been slow to grant almost all the necessary permissions for the power plant, the expert added.

Turkey's financial responsibility for the project is another major concern for Russia, especially after the majority shareholder Rosatom, a state atomic energy corporation in Russia, signed a deal with the Turkish Cengiz-Kolin-Kalyon consortium in June to sell its 49 percent stake to the latter, which amounts to nearly 9.5 billion dollars. The final investor agreement will be signed by the end of the year.

However, Russia suddenly demanded an audit for the credibility of the Turkish companies in early September.

Putin likely discussed the financing capabilities of these companies with Erdogan, Sezer said.

The Akkuyu nuclear station, near Turkey's southern Mediterranean coast of Mersin, is to be built in cooperation with Rosatom under a contract signed in 2010. The station will have four 1,200-megawatt Water-Water Energetic Reactor (VVER) units with the first expected to come online in 2023.