Chernobyl's Legacy Messy As Ever

["Sandy Perle" <sandyfl@earthlink.net>]

Sunday April 25 5:05 PM ET 

Chernobyl's Legacy Messy As Ever

KIEV, Ukraine (AP) - Thirteen years after reactor No. 4 exploded at 
the Chernobyl atomic power plant in then-Soviet Ukraine, the 
legacy of the world's worst nuclear accident remains as messy as 
ever.  

The downfall of the Soviet Union in 1991 provided hope for people 
still coping with the consequences of the April 26, 1986 explosion, 
offering promise that Chernobyl radiation victims would receive 
better treatment, that the leaky concrete-and-steel shelter covering 
the ruined reactor would be repaired, that an independent Ukraine 
would close the ill-fated plant for good.  

They're still hoping.

Urged by the West, Ukraine pledged to shut down the plant by 
2000. Now it seems unlikely that the pledge will be fulfilled.

Last week, President Leonid Kuchma said it flat out: Chernobyl will 
continue to operate until the West provides Ukraine with the 
estimated $1.2 billion necessary to complete two new nuclear 
reactors needed to compensate for the loss of the electricity 
Chernobyl provides.  

The Group of Seven richest nations promised aid in 1995 to help 
Ukraine close Chernobyl, but the nation, strapped for energy and 
cash, has complained that the money has been slow in coming.  

Kuchma says the G-7 also should help Ukraine build nuclear waste 
depositories and compensate the 6,200 Chernobyl employees who 
will lose their jobs.  

Ukraine's arguments seem to be linked more to its desperate 
financial position than energy problems.

The nation is heavily dependent on its five nuclear plants - but of its 
14 working reactors, only one is at Chernobyl.

The plant once had four reactors and plans for more. But then 
Chernobyl's reactor No. 4 exploded and caught fire, sending a 
radioactive cloud over much of Europe and contaminating large 
areas of Ukraine, Russia and Belarus.  

Another of the plant's Soviet-made reactors has been inactive since 
a 1991 fire and a third was stopped in 1996.

The working reactor, No. 3, has its own troubles. It underwent 
repairs for nearly three months and was restarted in March, only to 
suffer a daylong shutdown over a turbine generator malfunction later 
that month.  

The European Commission, the executive body of the European 
Union, has called on the Ukrainian government to shut down the 
troubled reactor, saying its operation is fraught with dangerous 
consequences. Ukrainian nuclear safety authorities dismissed the 
fears as baseless.  

Work on making the shelter covering the exploded reactor 
environmentally safe is proceeding slowly, although international 
donors have pledged $400 million of the $750 million needed. 
Safety concerns also have delayed construction.  

That work ``might take 50 and even 100 years,'' Yuriy Shcherbak, 
Ukraine's coordinator at Chernobyl talks with the G-7, wrote 
recently in the Stolichnye Novosti newspaper.  

Meanwhile, the Ukrainian government says it is increasingly unable 
to bear the long-term costs of the disaster after spending $5.7 
billion to deal with its consequences during Soviet times and more 
than $4 billion from 1992-97.  

And even the government admits that's not enough. With Ukraine's 
economy declining since the Soviet collapse, state funding covered 
only an average 51.6 percent of Chernobyl relief needs from 1996-
98, while this year's budget allocation of $443 million is only a third 
of what is needed, according to Emergency Situations Minister 
Vasyl Durdynets.  

Ukraine has a fearful health legacy to confront with that money: 
Nearly 400,000 adults and 1.1 million children are entitled to 
government aid for Chernobyl-related health problems.  

Shcherbak, a medic who wrote a respected book on Chernobyl and 
later served as Ukraine's ambassador in the United States, said 
the disaster's 13th anniversary brought him a sad feeling of 
continuity.  

``As an undefeatable evil ... Chernobyl will continue to exist for an 
indefinite period of time, posing ever new problems for
mankind,'' he said.

------------------------
Sandy Perle
E-Mail: sandyfl@earthlink.net
Personal Website: http://www.geocities.com/capecanaveral/1205

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