Swiss say no to speeding up phase-out of nuclear power plants

Geneva

SWITZERLAND'S ageing nuclear reactors will keep running for the foreseeable future, after voters on Sunday rejected a call to speed up the phase-out of the plants.

A full 54.2 per cent of voters and an overwhelming majority of Switzerland's 26 cantons voted against an initiative which would have forced three of the country's five nuclear reactors to close next year, according to final results.

Just a few months after Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant was destroyed in the March 2011 tsunami dis…