September 07, 2005
Ukraine: Activists, Experts Dispute UN Report On Chornobyl
What was the extent of the Chornobyl disaster?
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Environmental activists and researchers in some of the countries most affected by the Chornobyl disaster have rejected a new United Nations report that says the consequences of the 1986 explosion in the Ukrainian nuclear plant were not as dire as predicted. The report prepared by a group of 100 scientists concludes that some 4,000 people are likely to die as a result of the disaster. But activists and experts dismiss those figures as grossly underestimated.
Prague, 7 September 2005 (RFE/RL) -- Nataliya Preobrazhenska heads the Save The Ukrainian Children from the Chornobyl Catastrophe foundation and is a consultant to the Committee on Radiation Security of the parliament of Ukraine.
She told RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service that the 1986 explosion at the Chornobyl nuclear power plant continues to cause serious health and environmental problems for people living in the affected areas. “We must all know that we are not living after [the Chornobyl catastrophe], but [still] during the Chornobyl catastrophe,” she said.
Preobrazhenska was reacting to the new report released by the Chernobyl Forum, a group involving experts from eight UN agencies, including the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). The report found that besides thousands of workers who were exposed to high doses of radiation in the early days of the accident and thousands stricken with thyroid cancer, the impact on the rest of the population was not as severe as feared.
The report concludes that the death toll caused by radiation could reach a total of 4,000, which is much lower than previous estimates. Such a conclusion could affect national and international programs dedicated to helping people in the most affected areas of the disaster in Belarus, Ukraine, and Russia.
Preobrazhenska believes that the report does not tell the whole story. “It’s horrible, the IAEA statement is criminal!" she said. "I think it’s time for The Hague court to look at our figures and at what the IAEA says.”
Preobrazhenska said that the cancer rate in the region remains high as a result of radiation exposure caused by the accident. She said that only in 2003, more than 150,000 new cases of cancer were registered in Ukraine.