European Commission’s European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) had launched a month ago an investigation on how European Union (EU) PHARE funds had been spent in Bulgaria on the construction of a national depot for storing radioactive waste from the Kozloduy Nuclear Power Plant (NPP), OLAF’s director general Franz-Hermann Bruner said, as quoted by Dnevnik daily on October 31.

Bruner declined to provide further information before the end of investigation. European Commission data however, had shown that at least 500 000 euro had been extended on the project and allegedly a serious portion of the money had not been spent properly.

Eventually, the nuclear waste depot should be built close to the functioning fifth and sixth reactors of Kozloduy NPP. Bulgaria closed the first four reactors of the nuke plant by the end of 2006, after serious pressure from the EU over the facilities’ safety. The depot should be completed by 2015 with its cost estimated to reach 500-600 million euro. The money were secured by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and the Bulgarian state.

State-owned company Radioaktivni Otpadutsi (Radioactive Waste) was to build the depot and its executive director Boris Pekov said he was surprised to hear of the investigation. A month ago OLAF officers only interviewed employees of Radioaktivni Otpadutsi, Pekov said, as quoted by Dnevnik.

The tender for the one-million-euro-worth conceptual design preparation for the depot had been won by Parsons of the US and two Finnish companies. Pekov said that the tender was supervised by representatives of PHARE administration and Bulgaria’s Finance Ministry.