Bulgaria's parliament decided on Wednesday that the ballot in an upcoming referendum on the future of nuclear energy in the country would not include a reference to a specific power plant project.
"The MPs decided on holding a referendum on the construction of a nuclear plant in the country, in which the question would be worded as follows: Should we develop nuclear energy in the Republic of Bulgaria by building a new nuclear plant," the National Assembly said in a statement posted on its website.
A total of 101 MPs voted in favour and seven were against with no abstentions. The MPs of two of the opposition formations, the left-wing Coalition for Bulgaria and the Movement for Rights and Freedoms, did not take part in the vote.
The question was formulated by the parliamentary group of the ruling centre-right party GERB after earlier this year the socialists initiated a sign-in campaign in support of holding a referendum with a question worded "Should the nuclear power industry in Bulgaria develop through the construction of a nuclear power plant at the Belene site?"
A total of 543,639 signatures were collected in the campaign. The minimum number of authentic signatures required for a referendum to be called is 500,000.
Earlier this year, the government decided to abandon the project to build a nuclear power plant in the Danubian town of Belene and instead approved plans to raise the capacity of Bulgaria's existing nuclear station in Kozloduy.