French Energy Minister Eric Besson is against closing a nuclear power plant at Fessenheim as a symbolic gesture to please a "minority of public opinion", he told reporters on Monday.
"If it passes the tests, it should continue to operate, but if it fails them, it should be closed," Besson said.
France's nuclear watchdog gave its go-ahead earlier this month for France's oldest operating nuclear reactor in eastern France to continue working for another 10 years.
But the government could still decide to shut the plant, commissioned in 1978, permanently after results of post-Fukushima stress tests are made public around mid-November.
