France And U.S. Back Global Nuclear Liability Plan

France and the U.S. on Aug. 29 signed a joint statement supporting the establishment of a global nuclear civil liability scheme to adequately compensate victims of a nuclear accident. The International Atomic Energy Agency recommended the compensation regime as part of an effort to encourage nuclear safety and nuclear expansion as well as to ensure equitable and adequate compensation for accident victims, particularly in light of the meltdown of Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station reactors in 2011. The agreement, signed by U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest J. Moniz and French Minister of Ecology, Sustainable Development & Energy Philippe Martin, urges others to join with the U.S. and France, the two countries most dependent on nuclear energy. The pact would create the “worldwide trust necessary for the development of nuclear energy and related industrial activities,” Moniz and Martin said in a statement.