YABLOKO conducted an action by
the Russian Atomic Ministry commemorating the 25th Chernobyl disaster
Press Release
April 26, 2011
Today YABLOKO’s activists conducted an action
commemorating the 25th Chernobyl disaster. The action was
conducted by the Russian Atomic Ministry (Rosatom). The participants
of the picket paid tribute to the victims of the Chernobyl
tragedy and also spoke about the problems of the modern nuclear
energy sector.
Despite of the fact that the picket was agreed upon with
the authorities, the police and representatives of Rosatom
demanded from the participants of the action to move the picket
to another side of the street and did not allow put a banner
on the fence around Rostam’s territory.
The banner had a slogan “Let us save the world from the “atom
for peace” and photographs of the three reactors where accidents
had taken place – the Mayak nuclear power plant in the Chelyabinsk
region, Chernobyl nuclear power station and Fikushima in Japan.
However, YABLOKO’s leader Sergei Mitrokhin persuaded the police
that the picket should be conducted by Rosatom’s office and
the banner would be held by the activists.
YABLOKO’s activists also brought other posters with slogans
such as "No to construction of new nuclear power plants”,
“Chernobyl, Fukushima, which is next?", "No to floating
stations!". Activist of public movement Nuclear-Free
Belarus Roman Yesevich specially came from Belarus to support
the picket.
YABLOKO’s activists also brought the flags of the three countries
most affected by the nuclear catastrophe - Russia, Ukraine
and Japan. The flags had black mourning ribbons on. "First
of all it is a mourning action, but we are also stating that
that all the reassurances given by the Atomic [the Russian
Atomic Ministry] Minatom and then Rosatom and the international
nuclear lobby turned out to be unreliable after the Chernobyl
disaster," Sergei Mitrokhin told the journalists. He
also recollected that the atomic ministries had been assuring
the public that the accident like in Chernobyl would never
repeat, but the accident at the Japan’s Fukushima was awarded
the hazard rate 7 like in Chernobyl.
“Rosatom has maintained its most ambitious and costly nuclear
power plants development programme. USD 3 bln are annually
allotted from the federal budget for construction of new reactors,
and Rosatom has been focused on how to get more money rather
than safety issues,” Mitrokhin said.
He also voiced the picketers’ demands: more government's
attention to nuclear safety, withdrawal from service of all
the reactors with exhausted resource, allocation of funds
to safety measures and compensations to the victims, as well
as abolishment of importing of spent nuclear fuel into Russia.
The participants of the picket lit 25 candles and announced
a minute of silence to commemorate the victims of nuclear
catastrophes.
