World IN BRIEF : RUSSIA : Scientists Hail New Nuclear Reactors

Russian nuclear scientists appear to have learned the lessons of the Chernobyl accident and have vastly improved the design of their most modern reactors, the International Atomic Energy Agency said in Vienna. “It’s better than expected,” spokesman Hans Meyer said after a meeting last week between 39 agency and Western experts and 60 Russian counterparts near Smolensk, site of the most technologically advanced nuclear reactor in Russia. The 1,000-megawatt reactor is two generations beyond the type that exploded at Chernobyl in 1986.