ARMENIA AND TURKEY: CAN NUCLEAR POWER BECOME A FORCE THAT BINDS TWO ENEMIES?
Marianna Grigoryan

Eurasianet
March 31, 2009

As Turkey and Armenia inch closer to some potential form of
reconciliation, Armenian attention is increasingly focusing on whether
or not Turkey will opt to participate in the construction of a new
Armenian nuclear power plant.

A February 21 statement by Prime Minister Tigran Sarkisian that Yerevan
is "open for dialogue" about Turkish participation in the project has
sparked often heated debate in Armenia. Despite the public expression
of concern, Armenia’s minister of energy and natural resources, Armen
Movsisian, reaffirmed at a March 20 news briefing that the government
would be open to considering Turkish participation in the project. "Any
state can take part in the construction of the nuclear power plant,
including Turkey," Movsisian said.

The diplomatic trial balloon has not yet met with an official response
from Ankara. The results of the March 29 municipal elections in Turkey,
in which the governing AKP Party experienced a significant decline in
voter support, may make it more politically problematic for Ankara to
press ahead with a rapprochement with Armenia, some Turkish experts
say. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

Other Turkish observers believe that the idea indicates that the recent
thaw in Turkish-Armenian relations is here to stay. Trade between
the two countries encourages that point of view; by November 2008,
Armenia’s trade turnover with Turkey reached $251.2 million, a far cry
from the $953.3 million in trade with Russia, but higher than trade
with neighboring Georgia, according to the National Statistics Service.

Even so, the reaction in Yerevan to the idea of a Turkish-built
nuclear power plant remains chilly.

"Obviously, it is a political offer," commented Ruben Safrastian,
director the Institute of Oriental Studies of the National Academy
of Sciences of Armenia. "It’s a political gesture, not a good one,
which I think will not have any further development, or come true."

Without a nuclear power plant of its own, Turkey, Safrastian argues,
"lacks the resources" to take part in the project.

Bids for construction of the new power plant will start on April
1. Work on the project, overseen by the Ministry of Energy and Natural
Resources, is slated to begin by 2010, six years before the existing
33-year-old Metsamor nuclear power plant is slated to shut down. The
completed power station will be able to generate up to 1,200 megawatts
of electricity, at least double Metsamor’s output. Experts estimate
the project could cost upwards of $7.2 billion.

But with critical policy issues with Turkey still left unresolved,
the proposal for Turkish participation in the power plant project has
sparked criticism from many, including government coalition members.

Members of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation, a nationalist member
of Armenia’s ruling coalition, termed "doubtful and unacceptable"
the prospect of Turkish involvement in the power station project.

"Turkey’s participation in the construction of the nuclear power
plant is a threat to national security," stated Kiro Manoian, head of
the party’s office for political affairs. "I can’t really understand
the way those kinds of statements are made. It is a serious national
security problem."

Ara Nranian, a parliamentarian from the Armenian Revolutionary
Federation, listed three unresolved issues with Turkey that stand in
the way of close cooperation: Turkey’s efforts to block international
recognition of the Ottoman Empire’s 1915 slaughter of ethnic Armenians
as Genocide; the closure of its borders with Armenia in 1993, and
the country’s active support for Azerbaijan in its Nagorno-Karabakh
dispute with Armenia.

"When one makes a political gesture like that, it means you do not
have problems with the other side. But that’s not the case. Steps
should not be unilateral," Nranian commented. "If the step was meant
as a diplomatic move, then it was a poor one. I want to believe the
step was made without knowing [what they were doing]."

A spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the ministry
had no comments to make about the issue.

Ruling Republican Party of Armenia spokesperson Eduard Sharmazanov,
however, asserts that every single step was "calculated."

"Why can’t there be cooperation in the energy sphere, if we talk about
establishing relations without preconditions?" Sharmazanov said. "It’s
not an ordinary step; it’s a question of energy security. I don’t think
state officials think about security matters less than their critics."

In his February 21 comments, Prime Minister Sarkisian stated that the
new power plant will play a stabilizing role in the region. "We can
be a serious exporter of energy and clearly our neighbor countries
are interested in this area," Sarkisian elaborated in a March 14
interview with the daily newspaper Aravot.