The nuclear trade between France and Russia continues. This Tuesday morning, in the port of Dunkirk, in the North, the cargo ship Mikhail Dudin unloaded dozens of drums of enriched uranium and ten containers of natural uranium from Russia, according to Greenpeace. The NGO asks the Minister for Energy Transition, Agnès Pannier-Runacher, “the termination of contracts on uranium trade with Russia”.
“The continued nuclear trade with Russia, while the war in Ukraine rages, is outrageous. (…) The French nuclear industry is bound hand and foot with Russia all along the fuel route, from the extraction of uranium to the question of waste”, is indignant, in a press release, Pauline Boyer, in charge of the Nuclear and Energy Transition campaigns at Greenpeace France.
Contract signed in 2020
Contacted by 20 minutes, Port of Dunkirk did not respond. Asked by AFP about the destination of this load, the electricity group EDF did not respond either. Contacted by AFP, the nuclear group Orano (ex-Areva) indicated that “these transports did not concern either its materials or its facilities”.
On the other hand, the group confirmed to AFP that it had delivered to Russia “five or six” transports of reprocessed uranium (URT) which it owned until October, to the Seversk plant of the Russian public nuclear conglomerate Rosatom, under a contract signed in 2020 for a total volume of 1,150 tonnes.
“When the war broke out, there were no sanctions, but we took the decision to settle this contract, and the last transport took place in October,” an Orano spokesperson told AFP. AFP, confirming information from Le Monde.
Economic sanctions against Russia
In April, another NGO, Robin des Bois, unveiled the European Union’s authorization to award or continue “the execution of contracts for the operation, maintenance, decommissioning and management radioactive waste, fuel supply and fuel reprocessing (…)”. A provision listed in Official Journal of the European Union of 8 April 2022.
Clearly, the nuclear trade in radioactive waste between France and Russia could continue. At the time, the European Union, under the presidency of Emmanuel Macron, nevertheless took numerous economic sanctions against the country of Vladimir Putin, following the invasion of Ukraine. Recently, the French government nevertheless ordered EDF and Orano to stop exporting reprocessed uranium.