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20 years after CHERNOBYL

On April 7-9, 2006 the International Chernobyl Congress was held in Bonn, Germany. Sponsored by the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), the conference addressed many important issues such as human rights violations in correlation with radiation exposure, health, environmental impacts and governmental policy related to the April 26, 1986 nuclear explosion at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Station. Numerous physicians and scientists addressed the impact of the fallout, which released 400 times more radioactivity than was released at Hiroshima, drove a third of a million people from their homes, and has generated an epidemic of thyroid cancer and genetic damage. Several physicians stressed that perhaps the most devastating impact may be the psychological wounds borne by those who continue to live on contaminated land.

One presentation at the conference was delivered by Professor Angelina Nyagu, President of the Physicians of Chernobyl. Professor Nyagu presented examples of the growing number of health concerns related to Chernobyl since 1986. She said the cancer fuse lit by Chernobyl will claim 4,000 lives over the next 10 years, but equally devastating are the psychological wounds borne by those who had to flee their homes and continue to live on contaminated land. Many women feel they will give birth to unhealthy babies or babies with no future, while others feel they will eventually die from Chernobyl. She said current workers entombing the reactor face grave dangers as they expose themselves to some of the highest levels of radiation in the world. Nyagu stressed that even though workers wear protective suits and respirators, radiation is so high that workers constantly monitor their personal exposure meters and can risk working in some areas for no longer than 15 minutes. She also stressed that no permanent solutions have been found in the entombment process, which is expected to cost more than $800 million dollars. Nyagu notes there is strong evidence of radiation exposure linked to increases in heart disease, thyroid cancer among children, and depression which leads to alcoholism and smoking. Nyagu said that it took 20-25 years for some radiation-induced cancers to appear in the atom bomb survivors: “We are just at the tip of the iceberg.”

Alla Yaroshinskaya author of “Chernobyl: The Forbidden Truth,” revealed details of the secrecy and lies by bureaucrats and the extent of scientific corruption by the Gorbachev government after the Chernobyl accident. Yaroshinskaya reported that it took three days for the USSR and the official media to warn the people of the explosion at Chernobyl. She learned of the explosion from foreign radio reports on April 27 that Energy Block #4 of the Chernobyl reactor had blown up. “For two days people in Pripyat and surrounding cities were totally unaware that they were being exposed to some of the highest levels of radiation exposure the world had ever experienced in a civilian nuclear accident.” Yaroshinskaya stressed that people from highly contaminated villages are being relocated to hardly less contaminated villages; that they have serious health problems but are denied governmental services; and that food supplies are so inadequate that people have to eat radioactive produce to survive.

Yaroshinskaya’s research and publications have caught the attention of the western press, but despite the formation of a commission to investigate contamination resulting from Chernobyl, bureaucrats and politicians have successfully blocked most of the investigation. She closed her presentation by stating that we must be made aware of the global dimensions of Chernobyl and of the role of international nuclear agencies deceiving the world as to the true nature of what happened.

There were many interesting sessions throughout the two-day event focusing on the health effects of Chernobyl, the impact of Chernobyl on children’s health, the right to food in contaminated areas, remediation and entombment of contaminated areas of Chernobyl. Unfortunately not all the sessions had translators available for the non-German speaking delegations.

There were also participants from throughout the globe who drew strong correlations between the nuclear explosion at Chernobyl and the impact of uranium mining and milling on Indigenous Peoples in the southwestern United States (U.S.). Two panel discussions at the Congress discussed the impact of environmental genocide on the populations at Chernobyl, Laguna, Acoma and Navajo as human rights violations.

One panel emphasized the impacts of radiation exposure on Navajo, Laguna and Acoma miners, millers and other uranium workers during the historical legacy of uranium mining in the southwestern United States. The second panel addressed the history of uranium mining and milling on Navajo, Laguna and Acoma lands. Navajo Nation delegates were Phil Harrison and Cora Maxx-Phillips. Southwest Research and Information Center (SRIC) Board member Manuel Pino represented the Laguna Acoma Coalition for a Safe Environment, Indigenous Environmental Network and SRIC at the conference and meetings. The delegation stressed the historical impacts of uranium mining and milling devastation to the air, water, land, tradition, culture, animal and human life. Many correlations could be drawn between the history of uranium mining in the southwest and the nuclear explosion at Chernobyl. The impacts to human health were at the forefront of questions addressed in both panels.

Phil Harrison, a lifelong community activist from Red Valley, Arizona, said that less than ten percent of Navajo uranium workers who have filed claims for compensation under the 1992 Radiation Exposure Compensation Act and related 2000 Amendments have received any compensation from the federal government. He emphasized the hundreds of premature deaths of Navajo miners and the genetic defects to future generations have been attributed to uranium exposure. Harrison also pointed out that there are still thousands of un-reclaimed mines spewing tailings across the landscape on the Navajo Nation, many in close proximity to houses and grazing areas where Diné people live. He also stressed that Diné people are still living with the impacts of major uranium accidents, such as the 1979 Church Rock, New Mexico mill tailings dam spill, the largest accidental release by volume of radioactive material in U.S. history, which sent 1,100 tons of radioactive mill waste and 94 million gallons of contaminated liquid into the Puerco River.

Uranium mining brings together delegates from the U.S. and India. (L to R): Ganshyam Burlee, an Indigenous uranium miner from India suffering from radiation exposure; Shri Prakash, an activist from Jadugoda, India fighting against proposed uranium mining by Uranium Corporation of India (UCIL); Manuel Pino, Phil Harrison, and Cora Max Phillips, representing Navajo, Laguna and Acoma uranium miners and millers.

Cora Maxx-Phillips, Executive Director of the Navajo Nation’s Social Service Programs came as a representive of the Navajo Nation’s Office of the President. Maxx-Phillips said “uranium left a deadly legacy on the Navajo Nation which (President Joe Shirley) has called genocide." She said health and environmental issues, as well as the growing price of uranium on the world market and the initiation of mine exploration on the Navajo Nation were catalysts in the Navajo Nation Council passing the Diné Natural Resources Protection Act of 2005, banning future development and exploratory measures of uranium on Navajo Indian Country, the largest Indian reservation in the United States.

Manuel Pino from Acoma Pueblo, New Mexico, a professor of American Indian Studies at Scottsdale Community College, has conducted research on the impacts of uranium development at Laguna and Acoma Pueblos in New Mexico for the past 28 years. Pino stressed that living in the heart of the Grants Mineral Belt, the largest uranium ore producing area in the U.S., has brought devastating environmental, health, social, and cultural impact to the two Pueblos. The Jackpile Mine which operated on the Laguna Pueblo from 1952 to 1982 grew to be the largest open pit uranium mine in North America. The mine was situated 2,000 feet from the village of Paguate on Laguna Pueblo. Jackpile produced more than 24 million tons of some of the richest ore in the U.S. and consistently ranked as one of the top four or five uranium producers in the world during the life of the mine. After the mine closed it remained un-reclaimed from 1982-1989, exposing the village of Paguate to wind-blown tailings from the mine. In 1989, Laguna Pueblo formed Laguna Construction Company to reclaim the mine with $40 million from the Atlantic Richfield and Anaconda Mining Company which merged in 1970. Pino emphasized that the nuclear industry calls the reclamation successful although people in Paguate and villages downwind from the mine continue to report growing numbers of cancerous-related illnesses among the Laguna people. The problems at Laguna, Acoma and Navajo are similar with growing populations of former miners with cancerous related illness, contaminated surface and groundwater sources, and the continuing concern of living in contaminated communities.

Attendees of the Opening Plenary of the International Chernobyl Congress.

The conference was very informative, yet many participants were unaware of the impacts of uranium mining on Indigenous peoples of the southwestern U.S. Several members of the IPPNW and its U.S. counterpart the Physicians for Social Responsibility expressed an interest in networking and developing a working relationship with Indigenous Peoples in North America on issues regarding the nuclear fuel cycle.

– Manuel Pino