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Energy-hungry Turkey's nuclear flirtation with Russia came to a painful end last week when the government, under pressure from many fronts, canceled the September 2008 tender that awarded the contract to build and operate the country's first nuclear power plant to Russia's Atomstroyexport and its domestic partners. Turkey plans to build two nuclear power plants, one in the Black Sea Sinop region and the second in Akkuyu, near the town of Mersin, on the Mediterranean coast. The cancellation of the outcome of last year's controversial selection for the latter site came as a shock to many, including the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government itself.

Energy-hungry Turkey's nuclear flirtation with Russia came to a painful end last week when the government, under pressure from many fronts, canceled the September 2008 tender that awarded the contract to build and operate the country's first nuclear power plant to Russia's Atomstroyexport and its domestic partners. Turkey plans to build two nuclear power plants, one in the Black Sea Sinop region and the second in Akkuyu, near the town of Mersin, on the Mediterranean coast. The cancellation of the outcome of last year's controversial selection for the latter site came as a shock to many, including the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government itself.

Retreat from nuclear energy can no longer be halted, Germany's new Environment Minister Norbert Röttgen told daily Bild on Wednesday. "One can use atomic energy in the long run only when the majority of the people accept it," he said. "This hasn't been the case for years and in my estimation it's not going to change." The statement from Röttgen, a member of Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservative Christian Democrats, would appear to draw a line under the new centre-right government's decision to abandon a total phaseout of nuclear power by 2020. Merkel has said that the life of some reactors should be extended to use nuclear energy as a "transition energy" until renewables like solar and wind can produce more power.

Retreat from nuclear energy can no longer be halted, Germany's new Environment Minister Norbert Röttgen told daily Bild on Wednesday. "One can use atomic energy in the long run only when the majority of the people accept it," he said. "This hasn't been the case for years and in my estimation it's not going to change." The statement from Röttgen, a member of Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservative Christian Democrats, would appear to draw a line under the new centre-right government's decision to abandon a total phaseout of nuclear power by 2020. Merkel has said that the life of some reactors should be extended to use nuclear energy as a "transition energy" until renewables like solar and wind can produce more power.

A French attempt to win a 41-billion-dollar (27.2-billion-euro) contract to build nuclear power stations in the Emirates is at risk over pricing, the La Tribune newspaper reported on Wednesday. The newspaper reported that the top official at the presidential Elysee Palace, Claude Geant, had held a meeting with the heads of big French companies concerned on Tuesday to discuss a further reduction in the price which the government in Abu Dhabi considered too high. Present at the meeting were the head of French nuclear power group Areva, Anne Lauvergeon, the head of GDF Suez, Gerard Mestrallet, Christophe de Margerie who leads oil group Total and Henri Proglio of the electricity group EDF, the report said.

A French attempt to win a 41-billion-dollar (27.2-billion-euro) contract to build nuclear power stations in the Emirates is at risk over pricing, the La Tribune newspaper reported on Wednesday. The newspaper reported that the top official at the presidential Elysee Palace, Claude Geant, had held a meeting with the heads of big French companies concerned on Tuesday to discuss a further reduction in the price which the government in Abu Dhabi considered too high. Present at the meeting were the head of French nuclear power group Areva, Anne Lauvergeon, the head of GDF Suez, Gerard Mestrallet, Christophe de Margerie who leads oil group Total and Henri Proglio of the electricity group EDF, the report said.

The Chernobyl exclusion zone is still a desolate place. It is slightly larger than the 20-km (12 miles) restricted area currently in place around Fukushima in Japan. The Japanese nuclear crisis, caused by an earthquake and tsunami, happened just before the 25th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster, the world's worst nuclear accident. Even after a quarter of a century, no-one in Ukraine is permitted to live within 20 miles (30km) of the plant, though a few pensioners have insisted on returning to be close to their family graves. As you drive in, you can see abandoned villages being slowly swallowed up by the forest. People who left their homes here in 1986 had no idea they would never come back.

Natalia Manzurova, one of the few survivors among those directly involved in the long cleanup of Chernobyl, was a 35-year-old engineer at a nuclear plant in Ozersk, Russia, in April 1986 when she and 13 other scientists were told to report to the wrecked, burning plant in the northern Ukraine. It was just four days after the world's biggest nuclear disaster spewed enormous amounts of radiation into the atmosphere and forced the evacuation of 100,000 people. Manzurova and her colleagues were among the roughly 800,000 "cleaners" or "liquidators" in charge of the removal and burial of all the contamination in what's still called the dead zone.

These images are from the Sizewell protest in the UK from April 26th 2011

German activists show how to shut down a nuke plant video, followed by news report over social democrats opposition in meetings. 

"A prominent Liberal Democrat has called for Chris Huhne to resign immediately as energy and climate change secretary after emails were released detailing his officials' efforts to co-ordinate a PR response to the Fukushima disaster with the nuclear industry. Civil servants in the energy and business departments were apparently trying to minimise the impact of the disaster on public support for nuclear power. Andy Myles, the party's former chief executive in Scotland, said: "This deliberate and (sadly) very effective attempt to 'calm' the reporting of the true story of Fukushima is a terrible betrayal of liberal values. In my view it is not acceptable that a Liberal Democrat cabinet minister presides over a department deeply involved in a blatant conspiracy designed to manipulate the truth in order to protect corporate interests". The leader of the Lib Dems in the European parliament, Fiona Hall, said nuclear plans should be put on hold."

" Bulgaria's 30-year-old plan to build a nuclear power plant in an earthquake-prone area on the Danube may become the European Union's first atomic project doomed by Japan's disaster, leaving a $2 billion hole in the ground. The EU's poorest member faces a "mission impossible" to finish the Russian-designed plant because the Fukushima accident will require it to borrow an extra $2.1 billion for improved safety measures and insurance, according to a report by the research group Balkans and Black Sea Studies Center of Sofia."