MINSK, July 15. /TASS/. The Council of Ministers of the Republic of Belarus has greenlighted the protocol on amendments to the agreement with Russia on issues of lending for the construction of the Belarusian nuclear power plant (NPP), according to a respective decree released on the republic’s national legal online portal.

"To approve the protocol on amendments to the agreement between the government of the Republic of Belarus and the government of the Russian Federation on providing an export credit loan to the government of the Republic of Belarus for the construction of the nuclear power plant on the territory of the Republic of Belarus dated November 25, 2011 signed in the city of Moscow on March 2, 2023 and in the city of Minsk on March 3, 2023," the document reads.

Russia’s government passed the draft protocol extending the starting date of the Belarusian NPP construction loan’s settlement by Minsk in late February. The document stipulates that the loan will start being repaid no later than on April 1, 2024. Previously the starting date of the loan settlement was set at April 1, 2023. Moreover, the document specifies that all loan payments will be made in Russian rubles, with the possibility of loan payments to be made in US dollars envisioned earlier excluded.

The Belarusian nuclear power plant is being built near the city of Ostrovets, in the Grodno region. Its construction is based on the standard Russian project AES-2006. BelNPP consists of two power units with a capacity of 1,200 MW each. Atomstroyexport (part of the Rosatom corporation) is the general contractor. On November 3, 2020, the first power unit of the BelNPP was included in the country's unified energy system, and on June 10, 2021 it was put into commercial operation. In December 2021, fresh nuclear fuel was loaded into the reactor of the second power unit, from which the physical launch began. The commissioning of the second power unit was scheduled for the end of 2022, then postponed to the beginning of 2023.