Joint News Release

ELEVENTH ITER NEGOTIATIONS MEETING

CHENGDU , CHINA, 24OCTOBER 2005

Delegations from China, European Union, Japan, the Republic of Korea, the Russian Federation and the United States of America met in CHENGDU on 24October 2005 to continue their work to reach agreement on the joint implementation of the ITER international fusion energy R&D project.

This was the second time for China to host the ITER Negotiations meeting.

At the Meeting, delegates discussed and made substantial progress on a full range of legal, technical, and administrative topics, including staffing for ITER, policies for managing the project and its procurements, and the continuing joint drafting of the agreement on establishing the international ITER Organization to implement the project.

Delegates also discussed the possibility of India joining the Negotiations.  In light of reports presented to the Meeting from the recent joint exploratory mission to India, delegates identified a series of steps for the near future leading  towards a  possible agreement among all the Parties to India’s accession.

The twelfth ITER negotiations Meeting will be held in Korea on 6December, 2005.

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For further information, contact:

European Commission

Didier Gambier

+32 (2) 296-8034, didier.gambier@cec.eu.int

Cadarache Site Information

Michel Chatelier

+ 33-44-225-7001, michel.chatelier@cea.fr

Japan

Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology

Office of Fusion Energy

Shuichiro Itakura

+81 (3) 5253-4111 ext. 7820, sitakura@mext.go.jp

The People’s Republic of China

Ministry of Science and Technology of China

Department of International Co-operation

Luo Delong

luodl@mail.most.gov.cn

Russian Federation

Federal Agency of Atomic Energy (ROSATOM)

Vitaly Korzhavin

+7 (095) 239-2719, vkorzhavin@uant.faae.ru

United States

Department of Energy

Office of Fusion Energy Sciences

Michael Roberts

+1 301 903 3068, michael.roberts@science.doe.gov

Republic of Korea

Ministry of Science and Technology

Basic Research Support Division

Chang-Woo Kim

+82 31 436 8604, cwkim@most.go.kr