Fourteen years after an explosion at the Chernobyl plant the impact of the world's worst nuclear disaster is stark.
On 26 April 1986 an accident at a nuclear power plant at Chernobyl in Ukraine sixteen kilometres from the border with Belarus released huge amounts of radioactive contamination into the atmosphere.
At that time both countries formed part of the Soviet Union, which collapsed in 1991.
In a town near the edge of the exclusion zone a monument memorialises village communities situated in the vicinity of the nuclear reactor that no longer exist or were evacuated. The thousands of people who lived there were ordered to leave their homes in the days and weeks following the disaster.
RTÉ News travelled with Chernobyl Children's Project to an area inside the exclusion zone. What is now a wasteland was fourteen years ago a high-rise town. Some local people, including children, have returned. One man explains why he is here.
Those taken from their roots die sooner than those who stay.
It is hard to believe that this quiet countryside contains levels of radiation dangerous to human health, says Director of the Chernobyl Children’s Project Adi Roche,
There is a deceptive beauty here.
One section of Chernobyl’s nuclear power plant is still operational. According to a citizen’s group, fifteen hundred workers who participated in the cleanup after the disaster died because of exposure to radiation.
Civilians subsequently affected by radiation fallout number in the tens of thousands. Local campaigner Svetlana Dolganovskaya says the Ukranian government is not interested in the plight of Belarusians affected by the Chernobyl disaster.
To date the promised assistance from the international community to safely close the reactor is yet to arrive. The concrete sarcophagus built around it is no longer fit for purpose,
An RTÉ News report broadcast on 25 April 2000. The reporter is Carole Coleman.
