Russia's nuclear regulator Rostekhnadzor has issued an operating licence to the Kalinin nuclear power plant's unit 1 to June 2044.

The agreement creates a legal basis for cooperation between Russia and Mali and follows on from a roadmap for developing ties on peaceful uses of nuclear energy signed last year.

A roadmap has been agreed aiming to select a site, construct and commission two new VVER-1000 nuclear power units by 2035 in Russia's far eastern region of Primorsky Krai, which borders China and North Korea on the Pacific Coast.

Rosatom has signed an agreement with Uzbekistan's Uzatom Atomic Energy Agency to study a possible gigawatt-scale nuclear power plant featuring two or four VVER-1000 units.

Russia's Rosatom has been selected as the leader of an international consortium to build Kazakhstan's first planned nuclear power plant - with China being lined up to build a second one.

Rosatom says that its fifth generation nuclear fuel assemblies have been loaded into the VVER-1200 reactor core of Novovoronezh unit 6 as part of developments to involve VVER reactors in closing the nuclear fuel cycle.

In the latest meeting between International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi and Rosatom Director General Alexei Likhachev the two sides discussed the on-going security situation and issues relating to any future restart of the plant's units.

The 80-tonne tank, which has a capacity of 60 cubic metres, was produced at the Petrozavodskmash plant of Rosatom's machine-building division with the ceremonial shipment marking the plant's 65th anniversary.

Russian nuclear regulator Rostekhnadzor has issued a five-year licence extension for unit 2 of the Smolensk nuclear power plant, which will see its original 30-year life now extended to 45 years.

Rosatom Director General Alexey Likhachev has said the USA continues to buy enriched uranium from Russia and "in the context of the ongoing negotiations between the US and the Russian Federation ... we can expand the agenda of this cooperation".

International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi has said the flying of drones near Zaporizhzhia and other nuclear power plants in Ukraine "should stop immediately".

The manufacture of the first RITM-400 reactor unit has been completed for the Rossiya, which is scheduled to feature two of the reactors and become the world's most powerful nuclear-powered icebreaker.