Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has said South Korea could become a partner in developing Turkey’s planned Sinop nuclear power station, according to an interview with Yonhap News Agency reported by Reuters on Monday.
Turkey has been studying the technical and economic terms of the Black Sea project with state-run Korea Electric Power Corp (KEPCO), Erdoğan said. Ankara would weigh financing, electricity costs and the benefits to the Turkish economy before choosing a partner, he added — so the interview stops short of announcing a deal.
The remarks come as Erdoğan arrives in Seoul on Monday for a three-day state visit, his first to South Korea since 2018. He is due to hold a summit with South Korean President Lee Jae Myung on Tuesday, according to Seoul’s presidential office.
Beyond nuclear power, Erdoğan identified defence, semiconductors, artificial intelligence and robotics as potential areas for cooperation, and called for more South Korean investment and joint production in Turkey. He said the two countries were working towards a $15 billion bilateral trade target, while calling for efforts to address an imbalance in South Korea’s favour, and invited South Korean companies to take part in Turkish transport and logistics projects linking Asia and Europe.
Sinop, on Turkey’s Black Sea coast, has long been earmarked as the site of the country’s second nuclear power plant, after Akkuyu. An earlier deal signed in 2013 with a Japanese-French consortium collapsed after the estimated cost rose from about $15.8 billion to more than $44 billion, and Turkey and Japan agreed to discontinue cooperation in January 2020. Turkey’s nuclear regulator granted site approval for the Sinop site, at İnceburun, in April 2024.
Akkuyu, on the Mediterranean coast, is being built by Russia’s Rosatom and is expected to generate around 10% of Turkey’s electricity when complete, with its first reactor expected to come online in 2026. Turkey aims to reach 20 gigawatts of nuclear capacity by 2050.
What is not yet known is substantial: no timetable, reactor type, capacity or financing terms were set out in the reported interview, and whether KEPCO is selected, and on what terms, remains a decision for after the visit. Readers should note that this account rests on Erdoğan’s interview as reported by Yonhap and Reuters; no joint statement or signed nuclear agreement has been announced in connection with the visit so far.
Note: the featured image is a file photo of a ruin on the coast at Sinop, not a photograph of a nuclear plant site.
Sources: Reuters, “Erdogan says South Korea could partner in Turkey’s Sinop nuclear project, Yonhap reports”, 2 November 2026, https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/erdogan-says-south-korea-could-partner-turkeys-sinop-nuclear-project-yonhap-2026-11-02/ ; World Nuclear Association, “Nuclear Power in Turkey”, https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/country-profiles/countries-t-z/turkey ; Nuclear Regulatory Authority of Turkey, “Sinop Nuclear Power Plant”, https://www.ndk.gov.tr/en-US/sinop-nuclear-power-plant
