US embassy cable - 05ALMATY415

UNCLAS ALMATY 000415 
 
SIPDIS 
 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
DEPT FOR EUR/CACEN (JMUDGE), EUR/PRA (JCONLON) 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: ENRG, KNNP, KZ, PARM, ECONOMIC, Energy 
SUBJECT: KAZAKHSTAN: MINISTER SHKOLNIK'S RESPONSE ON BN-350 
LETTER 
 
REF: 12/14/04 O'MARA-MENNUTI EMAIL 
 
1. (SBU) In response to the Ambassador's December 20 letter 
to Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Shkolnik (ref), 
post received a reply under cover of a January 14 diplomatic 
note from the MFA.  Informal embassy translation of letter 
follows: 
 
 
Letter no. 10-01-134 dated January 11, 2005 
 
His Excellency 
Ambassador of the United States to Kazakhstan 
Mr. John Ordway 
 
Your Excellency: 
 
In reference to your letter related to the project of storage 
of the spent fuel from the BN-350 reactor, I inform you that 
we are now working to solve the problem of transmission of 
the preliminary project of physical protection of the BN-350 
complex in Aktau to the American partners. 
 
As you know, there is a list of secret information in 
Kazakhstani legislation, including data on physical 
protection system of nuclear facilities.  But we also have 
the procedures for transmitting such information to our 
country-partners' organizations participating in joint 
projects.  Unfortunately, some time is needed to meet these 
procedures, but it can't be the obstacle to continuing our 
work.  We are sure that you understand the requirement of the 
Law related to the information about the physical protection 
system of nuclear facilities. 
 
The problem is that the Agreement about Control, Accounting 
and Physical Protection of Nuclear Material of 1993, cited by 
you, does not directly address the transmission of 
information concerning physical security of nuclear 
facilities and therefore cannot be used as a legal basis for 
transferring this data.  But from our side, we assure you 
that we will take all the measures to facilitate the process 
of obtaining the necessary authorization to convey the 
information on the project of physical protection storage in 
Aktau.  I think that the issue of physical protection in the 
Working Group will not affect the continuing work of putting 
the BN-350 reaction out of operation. 
 
Sincerely, 
/signed/ 
Minister V. Shkolnik 
 
 
2. (SBU)  A scanned copy of dip note and Shkolnik letter was 
emailed to EUR/CACEN and EUR/PRA on January 26.  Please note 
that this translation is more accurate.  Post would 
appreciate Department's assessment of the potential impact of 
this GOK position on the BN-350 project. 
 
 
NNNN