The UN nuclear chief has called on countries to carry out risk assessments on their reactors within 18 months and for strengthened international safety checks to help prevent a repeat of Japan's atomic crisis.
Yukiya Amano, opening a ministerial meeting on improving safety after the Fukushima emergency, said UN experts should be able to carry out random reviews of nuclear power stations.
His proposals -- aimed at ensuring nuclear plants can withstand extreme events such as the earthquake and tsunami that crippled Fukushima -- may prove controversial for states which want to keep safety an issue strictly for national authorities.
"Public confidence in the safety of nuclear power has been badly shaken," Amano, director general of the International Atomic Energy (IAEA), said in a speech to ministers and regulators from the UN body's 151 member states.
