ANKARA, November 5. /TASS/. Turkey expects progress in the coming weeks toward commissioning the first power unit of the Akkuyu Nuclear Power Plant (NPP), said Turkish Energy Minister Alparslan Bayraktar who presented an energy development program through 2040 in Istanbul.

"I hope Turkey will realize its 70-year-old dream of transitioning to nuclear energy with the construction of the Akkuyu NPP. Construction of all four reactors is proceeding simultaneously. We have now reached a very important stage. Regarding the first reactor, I hope that in the coming weeks we will be able to take the next step [toward commissioning the power unit]. I will not make any definitive promises, as we have entered a phase that entails hundreds of individual tests. However, we are currently taking concrete steps toward bringing the plant into operation," he said.

Head of Russia’s state corporation Rosatom Alexey Likhachev told reporters last month that the physical commissioning of the first unit of the Akkuyu Nuclear Power Plant is planned for the second half of December 2026.