Czech and Austrian lawmakers failed to bridge their differences on a controversial Czech nuclear power plant in the first meeting of their joint group in Prague on Wednesday, according to dpa. The two countries disagree on whether the Czech Republic has observed the so-called Melk treaty, signed in the Austrian city of Melk in 2000 in order to prevent disputes over the plant. The treaty has required Prague to upgrade Temelin's safety and provide Vienna with detailed information on the plant. Czech leaders maintain that the plant is safe and that Prague has already fulfilled the requirements set by the treaty. However, Vienna is not convinced. While the Austrian lawmakers would prefer a third party to broker a deal between the two countries if further meetings fail to resolve the dispute, their Czech counterparts are opposed to the idea. The delegations could not even agree on where to meet next, CTK news agency reported. After the Austrian side rejected the Czech proposal to meet next in Temelin, the lawmakers decided that the two sides would meet in September in Vienna. The Austrian legislators promised that anti-Temelin protesters would not block borders to the Czech Republic for the duration of group's talks. The controversial twin-unit Soviet-era plant updated with US technology is located some 60 kilometres from the Czech-Austrian border. It was launched in 2000 despite claims by Austrian and Czech anti-nuclear activists that the plant is not safe. Since then, Temelin has been plagued with frequent glitches, all of which the Czech atomic safety authority has described as insignificant. Czech Industry and Trade Minister Martin Riman described the frequent incidents as the plant's "teething problems." An April 24 report released by Temelin's owner, the state- controlled power giant CEZ, put the number of incidents at the plant at 166. Several more have occurred since. Ever since its launch, Temelin has plagued Czech-Austrian relations. A major row came last winter, when it was revealed that Czech authorities failed to report a leak of mildly radioactive water which occurred just ahead of a late-February visit by Austrian Chancellor Alfred Gusenbauer to Prague. It was during that visit that Gusenbauer and Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek established the joint parliamentary group on Temelin. However, Gusenbauer was not informed about the leak while he was in Prague, but only a day later after he had returned to Vienna. An angry Gusenbauer then telephoned Topolanek to say that this "was not the form he imagined of open, friendly cooperation" between Vienna and Prague.
