Bulgaria using reactor sale statements as bargaining chip – Ukrainian MP Kucherenko

The Bulgarian side appears to be leveraging statements about halting the sale of two nuclear reactor vessels to Ukraine as a strategy to drive up the price, according to Oleksiy Kucherenko, First Deputy Chair of the Verkhovna Rada's Energy Committee.

"The Bulgarians are simply trying to raise the price. I get the sense they've realized that under current conditions, this is a valuable asset. And you probably saw reports a few days ago saying that the price is no longer $600 million but around $700 million. So they're negotiating. Is that normal? Well, everyone negotiates globally. This isn't just a standard contract," Kucherenko said on the Suspilne television network.

He suggested that this is one possible explanation for Bulgarian Deputy Prime Minister Atanas Zafirov's April 15 statement that the two VVER-1000 reactor vessels previously earmarked for the Belene Nuclear Power Plant would not be sold to Ukraine.

At the same time, Kucherenko questioned why no formal agreement was secured between the parties before Ukraine's parliament passed legislation allowing Energoatom to purchase the reactor vessels from Bulgaria.

"After the president of Ukraine initiated the law and parliament approved it, I assumed there was already an offer in place, some signed protocol, some sort of pre-contract agreement. Was there actually anything official between the governments? At least a memorandum of intent? Or was it just a verbal agreement between the two presidents?" the energy committee's deputy chair said.