A turbo-generator in the first reactor at the Soviet-built Temelin plant, the subject of fierce protests by neighbouring Austria, caused the power-down at dawn after a faulty seal was discovered, spokesman Milan Nebesar said.

The reactor's output was reduced to five percent of its 1,000 megawatt capacity.

Repair work on the problem, exactly the same which occurred late Tuesday, is expected to take a week, Nebesar said.

The Temelin plant, 60 kilometres (35 miles) from the Austrian border, was given approval on Monday to plug into the national grid for an 18-month trial period after a final 144-hour test of the number 1 reactor.

State power company Ceske Energeticke Zavody (CEZ) took over ownership of the plant after completion of the final test at the plant, which has suffered repeated technical problems since first firing up in October 2000.

The plant, originally built in the 1980s but upgraded with Western security equipment by US giant Westinghouse, has fueled a fierce diplomatic row between Austria and the Czech Republic in the last two years.

Austria's far-right has even threatened to veto the Czech Republic's EU hopes over Temelin, although Conservative Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel has agreed to abide by accords with Prague on safety and environmental guarantees.

EU Court Asked To Rule On Bulgarian Plant
Sofia (AFP) June 13, 2002 - A nuclear workers' group said Thursday it is appealing to the European Court of Justice to overturn an EU decision demanding the closure of Bulgaria's sole nuclear power plant.

The World Council of Nuclear Workers (WONUC), a Paris-based NGO supporting the nuclear industry, has filed a legal request demanding that the Luxembourg-based court consider the future of the Soviet-built Kozloduy plant.

"Kozloduy is not at all dangerous. The European Union's decision to close it does not seem justified to us. We are using the law to make our views prevail," WONUC President Andre Maisseau told AFP.

The European Commission has demanded the shutdown of Kozloduy's four oldest reactors as part of Sofia's negotiations to join the EU.

WONUC, which has been criticised for its uncompromising support of the nuclear industry by ecologists, has called on the EU court to reverse the decision.

"No expertise has been established to support the apparent danger of units one to four, or to justify their closure," WONUC said in its legal request.

Kozloduy, which was built around the same time as Chernobyl but is of a different type, was forced to close its two oldest units as part of a deal which allowed Bulgaria to begin EU membership negotiations in 1999.

The two parties are to decide this year when units three and four, which European experts say cannot be modernised, are shut down. Bulgaria, which has refurbished the units, insists they can be run safely until at least 2008.

If Bulgaria were excluded from the EU because it refuses to shut down Kozloduy "it would be terrible for democracy -- it would be an absolute scandal," said Maisseau.

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