(Xinhua)- - Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul- Gheit said Friday that his country would operate its first nuclear power station within 10 years, Egypt's official MENA news agency reported.

Abul-Gheit made the remarks before his departure for Alicante, a port city in Spain, to take part in the Middle East forum to discuss the peace process in the region and issues related to Euro- Mediterranean cooperation.

Asked about the country's peaceful nuclear program, the foreign minister said Egypt need to find alternative energy sources, like the nuclear one along with the solar and wind sources, to generate electricity due to rising prices of oil and natural gas.

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak announced on Sept. 21 that Egypt would continue its scientific research to develop peaceful nuclear technology regardless of its high cost.

Egypt started very limited nuclear technological research in 1957, but its nuclear program was frozen in 1986 in the aftermath of the accident at former Soviet Union's Chernobyl nuclear plant in the same year.

In 1968, Egypt signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and officially supports the elimination of nuclear weapons in the region.