Opening address

The program of this 9th Meeting of the International Group on Research Reactors IGORR includes are quite a number of fascinating new research reactor projects in France, Germany, Russia, Canada, China, Thailand, and in Australia. In addition to the session about New Facilities there are interesting sessions on the Upgrades and on the Optimization of Operation and Utilization of existing research reactors, on Secondary Neutron Sources, on Neutron Scattering applications, and on the aspects of Safety, Licensing and Decommissioning. Two particular projects of new research reactors are mentioned specially: the TRR-II project in Taiwan, has unfortunately been terminated last year because of a change to anti-nuclear of the ruling parties in the government - and the new FRM-II in Munich, Germany, which will hopefully survive such a political change and receive its green light for nuclear start up in the very near future. The charter of IGORR and its objectives are part of this address: The International Group on Research Reactors IGORR was formed to facilitate the sharing of knowledge and experience among those institutions and individuals who are actively working to design, build, and promote new research reactors or to make significant upgrades to existing facilities. The main IGORR objectives are to promote contacts between its members, to identify and discuss problems of common interest, to distribute newsletters about once or twice every year and to organize meetings about once every one-and-a-half years