The EU's highest court was urged by its top legal counsel to rule against Ireland for taking its complaint about the Sellafield plant to a United Nations court without consulting EU authorities.

The advocate general of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) said Ireland should pay costs in the dispute.

"By instituting UN dispute settlement proceedings against the UK concerning the Sellafield MOX Plant, without prior consultation with the (European) Commission, Ireland has failed to fulfill its treaty obligations," the advocate general's office said in a statement.

Ireland Environment Minister Dick Roche said the advocate general's opinion was not final and remained to be considered and ruled on by the ECJ sometime later this year.

He vowed to continue to fight against Sellafield, situated on the northwest English coast, across the Irish Sea from Ireland.

"The Government will continue to pursue every diplomatic and legal option open to it at all international fora in pursuit of our long-standing policy to secure the safe and orderly closure of the plant.

"It is our duty and our obligation to the people of Ireland to pursue these avenues even if the outcome may be uncertain."

Roche said the Sellafield plant "raises significant environmental and other issues for Ireland" and legal action already taken had "yielded new and improved methods of information exchange and for cooperation between Ireland and the UK".

Roche will shortly be meeting EU Energy Commissioner Andris Piebalgs and Justice Commissioner Franco Frattini and said he would be pressing them to take action on Sellafield.

"I will leave them both in no doubt as to our expectations in this regard.

"The Irish Government will expect the Commission to exercise its competence robustly in respect of the continued operation of the Sellafield plant, a situation which has clearly not been the case to date," Roche said in a statement.

Ireland has no nuclear plants.

Sellafield is closer to Dublin than to London and its operation has been a source of tensions between the two governments for decades.

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