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Chernobyl anniversary passes, but problems remain

KIEV: The 10th anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster focused worldwide attention on the tragedy but did little to ease the problems of Ukraine and its neighbours in tackling the colossal human and economic legacy.

World leaders offered sympathy and encouragement -- and some money and medicines -- but impoverished Ukraine, Belarus and Russia must still cope with increases in thyroid cancer and other diseases.

Ukraine has the additional task of keeping its promise to close Chernobyl's two working reactors by the year 2000, notwithstanding Western pledges of $3 billion in help and a commitment to study how to replace the cracking "sarcophagus" encasing the reactor ruined in the disaster.

Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma said the disaster had shown the world must ensure the safe use of nuclear technology.

"The main lesson of Chernobyl is that the nuclear burden on the planet has to be reduced," he told parliamentarians and veterans of the Chernobyl clean-up operation at a meeting in Kiev's opera house.

Ukraine, he said, had "set a good example" by agreeing to close down Chernobyl "so that present and future generations are not subject to nuclear horrors".

At the Chernobyl plant itself, 140 km north of Kiev, hundreds stood in silence to remember their dead colleagues.

But its director and many of the 6,000 employees still bitterly oppose the plant's closure and dispute claims by Western experts that it is still unsafe despite improvements made in the past 10 years.

A meter near the plant showed the level of radiation between 80 and 85 milliroentgens per hour -- far less than the 750 measured at the spot 10 years ago but still four times higher than what is seen as a safe level.

A top official of Ukraine's nuclear industry told workers they could win back public approval -- if they ran their plant safely. But commemorative events were marred this week by a minor release of radiation blamed on lax working practices.

The United States sent $11 million in medical supplies and President Bill Clinton praised Kuchma's pledge to shut the plant as "a goal of the highest order". Japan offered $25 million to ensure safety at Ukraine's 15 nuclear reactors.

Mikhail Gorbachev, Kremlin leader during the accident, denied authorities had misled the people. Rather, they had been unprepared and had not known what to do. "Someone said that Gorbachev went grey in those weeks. Yes, I did," he said.-Reuter