The Turkish parliament passed a bill Friday fixing the legal framework
for the country's first nuclear power plants, overriding stiff
objections from environmentalists and opposition parties.
At a stormy session that began Thursday afternoon and
continued overnight, legislators amended several technical provisions
in the original draft, which former president Ahmet Necdet Sezer had
vetoed in May.
The legislation authorizes the energy ministry to run and
finalize tenders for the construction of nuclear power plants and
decide on their capacity and location.
It provides for public institutions to build the plants if there is no interest from the private sector.
To take effect, the bill now needs the approval of President Abdullah Gul, who took office in August.
Turkey has said it plans to build three nuclear plants with a
total capacity of about 5,000 megawatts to become operational in 2012
in a bid to prevent a possible energy shortage and reduce dependence on
foreign energy supplies.
But the plan and the possible location of one of the
reactors - Sinop, a Black Sea coast city 435 kilometers northeast of
Ankara - triggered protests from residents and environmentalists.
Turkey abandoned earlier plans to build a nuclear plant in
July 2000 amid financial difficulties and protests from
environmentalists in Turkey and neighboring Greece and Cyprus.
Opponents argued that the proposed site - Akkuyu, on the
Mediterranean coast - was only 25 kilometers from a seismic fault line.