Georgia’s ex-president Eduard Shevardnadze urged the Georgian authorities to immediately launch negotiations with Armenia with respect to safety of Metsamor Nuclear Power Plant (NPP).

“Reports about the Armenian NPP’s condition raise serious concerns. The Armenian NPP turned out to be in the most deplorable condition and there are not any safety guarantees, what threatens the entire region,” Asaval Dasaval weekly quoted Shevardnadze as saying.

He thinks that under such conditions Georgia should launch negotiations with Armenia to avoid the expected tragedy.

The Metsamor NPP, which has been operated since 1976, is located in a seismic zone, around 30km west of Yerevan, Armenia’s capital. After the 1988 disastrous earthquake in Spitak, the Armenian authorities decided to close the nuclear plant. In 1993 the NPP was re-launched.