Leaders from over 30 countries meet in Brussels to promote nuclear energy

BRUSSELS: In the shadows of a massive monument glorifying nuclear energy, over 30 leaders and delegations from around the world backed the idea of usi...

BRUSSELS: In the shadows of a massive monument glorifying nuclear energy, over 30 leaders and delegations from around the world backed the idea of using the controversial energy source to help achieve a climate-neutral globe while providing countries an added sense of economic and security independence.

Such a summit would have been unthinkable a dozen years ago after the 2011 Fukushima nuclear accident in Japan, but a warming planet creating a need to phase out fossil fuels and the war in Ukraine laying bare dependence on Russian energy have turned the tide in recent years.

"We have to do everything possible to facilitate the contribution of nuclear energy,” said Rafael Grossi, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency. "It is clear: Nuclear is there. It has an important role to play,” he said.

The one-day meeting is being held next to the 1958 Atomium, the 102-meter (335-foot) -tall construction of the nine iron atoms, which sought to promote the peaceful use of nuclear energy in the wake of the nuclear bomb explosions at the end of World War II and their use as a geopolitical deterrent ever since.

Fatih Birol, executive director International Energy Agency, tried to reinvigorate that peaceful mission.