MOSCOW, January 21 (RIA Novosti) - Russia will be able to build a nuclear power plant in Belarus without a tender once the two ex-Soviet republics sign an inter-governmental agreement on civilian nuclear power use, Russia's Rosatom said Wednesday.

Russia and Belarus agreed to sign the inter-governmental agreement in the first quarter of 2009 during talks on Wednesday between the Belarusian government and a Rosatom delegation.

"The signing of this agreement opens up the possibility for the parties to switch to direct negotiations on a contract for the construction of the first Belarusian nuclear power plant on a turnkey basis," Rosatom said.

Belarus plans to build a nuclear power plant with a capacity of 2,000 MW, with the first unit to come online in 2016 and the second in 2018. The plant is expected to have Generation III water-moderated reactors.

Belarus earlier announced a tender for the plant and sent invitations to Rosatom, French-German firm Areva, and U.S.-Japanese company Westinghouse-Toshiba to participate in the tender.

Rosatom and Areva eventually confirmed their intention to participate, while no official response was received from Westinghouse.