Reuters: French authorities sued for Chernobyl effects]

[Chuck Cooper <ccc@pp.pdx.edu>]

Gary Greenberg wrote:



> French prosecutor orders Chernobyl sickness probe

>

> http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=11604

>

> FRANCE: July 17, 2001

>

> PARIS - The Paris public prosecutor's office ordered an investigation

> yesterday into whether French citizens fell sick because of the 1986

> Chernobyl nuclear disaster, judicial sources said.

>

> The decision follows legal moves begun by a group of 51 plaintiffs

> with thyroid ailments who allege French authorities failed to warn the

> public of the dangers of radioactive fallout from the world's worst

> nuclear disaster.

>

> The sources said the prosecutor's office had determined there were

> sufficient grounds to launch an inquiry into the complaint, which the

> group filed against persons unknown for unintentional injury and

> associated counts.

>

> An investigating magistrate will conduct the probe. Such a move under

> French law does not necessarily lead to charges.

>

> The plaintiffs, backed by two pressure groups, allege the French

> authorities did nothing to alert people to the potential dangers from

> a radioactive cloud that drifted west from Chernobyl when a reactor

> exploded in April 1986.

>

> The plant in Ukraine shut down for good last December.

>

> Last year, a 31-year-old Frenchman suffering from thyroid cancer,

> Yohann van Waeyenberghe, lost an attempt to have criminal proceedings

> launched against French officials for alleged bodily harm in the

> Chernobyl affair.

>

> A court ruled Waeyenberghe could not demonstrate a scientific link

> between his illness and the accident.

>

> Radioactivity from the Chernobyl explosion drifted across France

> between April 27 and May 5, 1996.

>

> West Germany, Austria and Italy took various precautions, including

> restrictions on the consumption of milk and dairy products, but French

> authorities said there was no need for special measures to protect

> against any health risks.

>

> An official French scientific study published last December estimated

> the incidence of thyroid cancer in France had risen fivefold among men

> and more than doubled among women between 1975 and 1995.

>

> The study, however, said the rise had been noted before the Chernobyl

> disaster and that the causes had not been established. It criticised

> the authorities for failing to monitor the population for evidence of

> cancer risks after the accident.

>

> REUTERS NEWS SERVICE



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