A spokesman for Egypt's Ministry of Electricity and Energy announced plans on Thursday to issue an international tender in January for the construction of a nuclear power plant at Dabaa, near the Mediterranean coast.
Egypt put its nuclear program on hold in 1986 after the Chernobyl nuclear plant disaster in Ukraine. Twenty years later, an announced renewal of the program was again put on hold when President Hosni Mubarak was ousted during the "Arab spring."
Aktham Abouelela, a spokesman for the energy ministry, said the plant "will be a pressurized water reactor with a capacity of 950 to 1,650 megawatts. The station will have two units," according to Business Report.
Meanwhile, just this Wednesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu visited Egypt to discuss an arms deal, which reportedly will see Egypt purchase $15 billion worth of military equipment under partial Saudi funding.
Egypt and Saudi Arabia have been falling out with the US of late, particularly after the US partially froze $250 million in military aid to Egypt following the unrest in the country since former President Mohammed Morsi was deposed in July.
Iran's nuclear program has raised fears of a Middle East nuclear arms race. A BBC report last week revealed that Saudi Arabia has invested in Pakistan's nuclear weapons projects and could potentially obtain a nuclear weapon very quickly.