After a meeting in Paris, Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen and his French counterpart Bernard Kouchner have said that there has to be a debate on nuclear energy now that fuel prices are rising. The two ministers believe the European Union should be less dependent on oil and gas imports and more thought should be put into new energy sources including nuclear power.
At the moment, nine percent of electricity used in the Netherlands is from nuclear energy, most of it imported from France. The Dutch government does not want to build new nuclear power stations, but Mr Verhagen says it is hypocritical to say we are against nuclear power, when we actually import it.
France holds the presidency of the EU as of 1 July and wants to put energy issues at the top of the agenda.