Sweden: international participation possible in the KBS-3 Court Hearing
The Swedish Land and Environmental Court (MMD) announced on 3 May 2017 that it requests an indication of intention to participate in the main court hearing on the Swedish nuclear industry's spent fuel plan, called the KBS-3 application. This is an oral hearing open to the public, where image presentations may be made, e.g. using PowerPoint, and films shown.
The court has also requested comments on the preliminary schedule, which is over five weeks from September 5 to October 27, 2017. The deadline given by the court for both comments on the schedule and intention to participate is May 17, 2017. The full 12-page notification is available in English at www.nonuclear.se/kbs3#en. The Swedish version is available at e.g. http://nonuclear.se/en/kbs3#tidplaner and http://www.mkg.se/aktbilagor (aktbilaga 522). It is stated in the document that the schedule will be confirmed in July 2017 at the same time as the public is officially notified.
The court has stressed that advance notice of participation is not obligatory, though it facilitates the court's planning. Regarding the language spoken for presentations, the May 3 notification from the court reads: "You must inform the court if you intend to provide comments in a language other than Swedish and in that case during which point in the court procedure. Information: the main hearing will be held in Swedish. The court will arrange any interpreter."
The Swedish Environmental Movement's Nuclear Waste Secretariat (Milkas, see www.milkas.se) welcomes proposals for cooperation from organisations and individuals interested in participating in the September-October 2017 KBS-3 hearing.
For information in English see: www.nonuclear.se/kbs3#en and www.mkg.se/en
‒ Miles Goldstick
Anti-nuclear Action Summer in Europe
Anti-nuclear groups are encouraging people to participate in numerous events planned in Europe in the coming months. Details of the events are posted on the Nuclear Heritage Network website: http://actionsummer.nuclear-heritage.net.
Here's a list of some of the events ‒ in Germany unless otherwise specified:
June 2: Kulturelle Widerstandspartie in Gorleben
June 9-26: raft tour against atomic transports from Trier to Cologne
June 25: human chain action via Tihange (Belgium) – Lüttich (Belgium) – Maastricht (Netherlands) – Aachen (Germany)
July 8: Anti-nuclear block in G20 protests rally in Hamburg
July 12-18: "international week" against nuclear weapons at Büchel air base in Alflen
July 17-23: International Anti-nuclear Summer Camp in Döbeln
July 28-29: e-Ventschau benefit open-air for Fukushima and Chernobyl victims in Ventschau
July 31 - August 6: War Starts Here Camp close by the Gefechts-Übungs-Zentrum Altmark (GÜZ) in Potzehne in Colbitz-Letzlinger-Heide
August 7-16: Internationalistic Anti Nuclear Summer Camp and Free Flow Festival in Gedelitz
August 11-13: Festival Les Bure'lesques in Bure (France)
In the UK, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament is organizing a conference to be held on June 17 in London titled 'No need for nuclear: the renewables are here!' The premise of the conference is that the UK government is obsessed with backing nuclear whereas experts say renewable energy is safer, healthier, more sustainable, quicker and cheaper. More information is posted at http://cnduk.org/NoNeedForNuclear
From November 2‒4, the Antinuclear World Social Forum will be held in Paris. Since the first World Social Forum (WSF) held at Porto Alegre in 2001, the anti-globalization movement has expanded and consolidated. Several WSFs took place in Latin America, in Asia, in Africa and, in August 2016, in North America. In 2013 and 2015, nuclear issues have been the subject of several workshops and the first Antinuclear Social Forum was held in spring 2016 in Tokyo, where a "Call for a nuclear-free world network" was launched. In Montréal, the second Antinuclear Forum took place within the WSF.
Since France is the most nuclearized country in the world in proportion to the number of inhabitants, French antinuclear organizations thought it relevant to host the next Antinuclear WSF in Paris, from 2 to 4 November 2017. The call for workshop proposals is open until July 15. For more information see www.wsfnonuke.org
Chernobyl remembered
Political leaders of Ukraine and Belarus toured the site of the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear accident on April 26, the 31st anniversary of the disaster.1,2 Speaking near the site of the disaster, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko said: "Both Belarusians and Ukrainians know that the Chernobyl catastrophe knows no borders."
Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko called the explosion and its dire aftermath "an unhealing wound which we as a people live with". He added: "Perhaps more than anyone else, the Chernobyl tragedy affected our Belarussian brothers." About a quarter of Belarus was contaminated and a 2,200-square-kilometer (85-square-mile) sector of Belarus was declared unfit for human habitation.
In Minsk, the capital of Belarus, 400 people marched on April 26 to mark the Chernobyl anniversary and to protest the construction of a nuclear power plant in Belarus.3 The demonstrators said authorities are increasingly allowing crops to be grown on contaminated land. They also urged authorities to stop the construction of the nuclear plant, which is scheduled for completion in 2019.
On April 26, Greenpeace Russia activists on inflatable boats rolled out a banner reading "No to floating Chernobyl" near the floating nuclear power plant 'Akademik Lomonosov' in St. Petersburg. They protested against the plans of the Russian nuclear corporation Rosatom to fuel and activate the two-reactor floating plant right in the centre of Russia's second biggest city.
"The authorities ignore the danger and put five million city residents under risk", said Rashid Alimov, Greenpeace Russia energy campaigner. "Rosatom says that Greenpeace is seeding radiophobia among people. But we just say that the risk of an accident is absolutely not justified. And the price to pay for an error is too high".
Greenpeace's position is supported by the Russian Chernobyl Union that unites liquidators ‒ those who fought to contain the Chernobyl disaster in 1986 and suffered greatly as a result.
Until recently it was officially forbidden in Russia to build power reactors closer than 100 kilometres to big cities like St. Petersburg. Now, the Baltic Shipyard plans to fuel and start the two reactors in the centre of the city. Upon the completion of tests, the floating nuclear plant is to be towed to Chukotka in the Far East and installed off the town of Pevek.
Rosatom has made statements about using floating nuclear plants for the industrial exploration of the Arctic regions and has signed treaties with oil, gas and coal mining companies to provide its nuclear fleet to secure the transportation of the extracted fossil fuels along the Northern Sea Route.
In March, New Scientist provided new details on a nuclear disaster four times worse than Chernobyl in terms of the number of cases of acute radiation sickness.5 In August 1956, fallout from a Soviet nuclear weapons test at Semipalatinsk in Kazakhstan engulfed the Kazakh industrial city of Ust-Kamenogorsk and put more than 600 people in hospital with radiation sickness.
1. Deutsche Welle, 26 April 2017, 'Ukraine, Belarus leaders mark Chernobyl anniversary', http://p.dw.com/p/2byge
2. AFP, 26 April 2017, 'Ukraine, Belarus leaders mark Chernobyl anniversary', www.terradaily.com/reports/Ukraine_Belarus_leaders_mark_Chernobyl_annive...
3. Associated Press, 26 April 2017, 'Belarus march against nuclear power on Chernobyl anniversary', http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/belarus-march-nuclear-power-che...
4. Greenpeace, 26 April 2017, 'No to floating Chernobyl!', www.greenpeace.org/russia/en/news/nuclear-26-04-2017/
5. Fred Pearce, 20 March 2017, 'Exposed: Soviet cover-up of nuclear fallout worse than Chernobyl', www.newscientist.com/article/2125202-exposed-soviet-cover-up-of-nuclear-...