FOR THE RECORD: President Kuchma on the shutdown of Chornobyl (04/22/01)

CHORNOBYL: THE FIFTEENTH ANNIVERSARY

FOR THE RECORD: President Kuchma on the shutdown of Chornobyl

Following is the text of the address by President Leonid Kuchma of Ukraine on the occasion of the closure of the Chornobyl nuclear power station on December 15, 2000. (The English-language text, released by the Embassy of Ukraine in Canada, was edited for clarity by The Weekly.)

I address the Ukrainian people, heads of states, governments and parliaments of foreign countries, and the whole world community in connection with an event that has milestone significance for mankind, for everyone who lives and will live on our Earth.

Today, on December 15, 2000 years after the birth of Christ, I issued an instruction to stop the third power unit, the last of those functioning at the Chornobyl nuclear power station.

This signifies the closure of the facility that entered history as the [site of the] biggest and the most horrible catastrophe.

Fifteen years have passed since the day when the fire at the destroyed nuclear reactor illuminated a new phase in civilization, which in all languages was dubbed the "post-Chornobyl" era.

Since April 26, 1986, the name of this small town in Polissia lost its original, geographical meaning and obtained a global political and ecological sense.

It joined the symbolic list of tremendous and devastating cataclysms that entered history as the distinctive marks of their epochs: Pompei, Guernica, Hiroshima.

The words "Chornobyl nuclear power station" epitomize a new phenomenon: nuclear energy that went out of control, a practical materialization of the threatening warnings that nature had sent many times to humankind for their frivolous, thoughtless and felonious treatment.

For Ukraine the act of decommissioning the Chornobyl nuclear power station is, from many points of view and without exaggeration, an event of epochal importance.

In so doing we, first of all, pay tribute to the memory of those who died of the diseases caused by this catastrophe while eliminating the consequences of the disaster.

Secondly, we confirm once more that we are fully committed to our obligations to the world.

Thirdly, we are finally parting with the totalitarian legacy and its tyranny, indifference and cruelty to human beings, society and nature.

And fourthly, we reiterate our intention to build our future responsibly, guided by our European choice, as well as concern for the future generations of the Ukrainian people and the whole of humanity.

This decision was conceived by the harrowing experience of the previous 15 years. Ukraine has to pay bills it has not signed and to do penance for sins it has not committed.

Its citizens were the first to step into the fire and into the invisible yet murderous field of radiation with the aim of protecting the whole planet from the disastrous fire at the cost of their own lives.

And by their experience they paid the most expensive price in order to give mankind the key to solving such unprecedented problems.

What is Chornobyl for Ukraine?

It is nearly 3.5 billion people affected by the catastrophe and its consequences.

It is almost 10 percent of the territory affected by direct radiation.

It is 160,000 people from 170 localities, who had to abandon their homes and move to other places.

By quoting these sad statistics we do not forget about other countries and peoples on whose lives the greatest technological catastrophe of the 20th century also has left its ominous mark.

Fate and history have decreed that our state has to bear its Chornobyl cross mostly by itself, dealing alone with its difficulties and trials.

The total economic expenses related to the catastrophe at the Chornobyl station have already totaled $130 billion.

We are compelled to further expend enormous material and financial resources, first of all, to protect the affected population and rehabilitate the natural environment.

In some years such expenses reached 12 percent of the state budget - a sum that considerably exceeds budget allocations for science and culture. I would like all of you to pay attention to this.

I would like the following fact to be considered as well. Ukraine is losing the Chornobyl nuclear power plant at a time when its economy with its extremely deformed structure and vast power consumption has just started to recover after a long crisis in difficult conditions in the realm of fuel and energy and in the winter period.

To these factors extremely adverse weather conditions were added, and on extensive territories this has become a kind of natural disaster.

Thus, to lose a minimum of 5 percent of generating capacities means being ready, not only for significant additional losses, but also for considerable risk - especially since after its closure the Chornobyl nuclear power plant is transformed from a producer of electric power to a consumer.

All of that is true, but Ukraine is taking this step consciously and voluntarily, in accordance with the highest priority interests of our people and the international community.

We realize that Chornobyl is a threat to the entire world. Consequently, we are ready to sacrifice a part of our national interests for the sake of global safety.

The implementation of the decision on the Chornobyl plant's closure that was declared in the beginning of the 1990s and confirmed five years ago in the Ottawa memorandum is the second unprecedented good will act by the Ukrainian state. Before that came the renunciation of the world's third largest nuclear arsenal.

I hope the world appreciates the importance and humanity of such approaches - and is assured of our transfer of nuclear security problems from the sphere of declarations to the level of real, practical actions.

I emphasize this with regard to another, probably the most dreadful and tragic, Chornobyl consequence.

This is the constant fear of the people for their lives and health, for the fate of their children and grandchildren, for the ecology of the lands and forests, seas and rivers, subterranean waters. The fear that exists regardless of where they live - near the wrecked reactor and contaminated radioactive zone, or thousands of kilometers away.

An area that is desolate, silent and hostile to all that is living and normal, located several dozen kilometers away from the Ukrainian capital is the real picture - not one created by one's imagination or by computer - of what could happen to the planet if people lack reason and caution in their conduct with the achievements of science and technology.

The Chornobyl firefighters and liquidators have shielded mankind from such a possibility - as their predecessors from Kyivan Rus' safeguarded Europe at the dawn of the Renaissance from alien incursions.

Today's act, having eliminated the delayed-action nuclear mine in the heart of Europe, is the beginning of relief from the Chornobyl syndrome in Ukraine as well as globally. The sword of Damocles that all these years has been hanging above us is passing into oblivion.

At the same time, this dreadful page of modern history cannot be considered to be completely turned over. Chornobyl's cataclysms remain, but they have been transferred into a new dimension.

Beyond the turn of the centuries and millenniums there is a new era awaiting us, a new one in the post-Chornobyl sense as well. Yet, it raises more questions than gives answers.

Before us is the great, complicated and long task of bringing the station out of operation and transforming it into an ecologically secure system with a "shelter" above the damaged fourth energy unit.

Before us are social security issues - ensuring the well-being of the station's workers who are being dismissed and the members of their families, determining and planning the future of the city of Savutych where they all live.

Not one of these people, not a single family, is to be abandoned.

All of this requires great funds that Ukraine at the moment does not have at its disposal.

We, as both a state and a nation that have suffered the most from the Chornobyl catastrophe and its consequences, have the right to rely on the support of the international community - the support of international assistance programs that are of vital importance as well as of human compassion and an understanding of the problems we face.

Firstly, the decision on the Chornobyl nuclear power station has been adopted and implemented under the guarantees of such assistance - first and foremost on the part of G-7 member-states.

Secondly, there is a need, that increases with each passing day, for mankind to unify all efforts for safe existence in harmony with nature, in preventing technogenic catastrophes of global and regional scales, in [halting] proliferation of nuclear technologies.

Chornobyl is the most obvious, but not the only, evidence of such a necessity.

The consequences of accidents at civilian and military nuclear facilities, chemical and other enterprises, do not recognize any state borders. The danger emanating from them is common to all of us, as is our living environment.

Let us remember that globalization and other post-industrial realities make the present world still tighter and more interconnected. This world does not end with the threshold of our houses and the boundaries of our states.

According to one scientist/physicist, we have the only copy of the Universe, which we cannot experiment with.

Let us repeat - paraphrasing great thinkers - that wisdom is the daughter of experience.

And experience testifies that the content and consequences of technogenic disasters rise above scientific and political, and other differences. They demand the employment of all channels of international cooperation, so that nowhere, never and under no circumstances should a man-made disaster happen on our planet.

And that, in my mind, is the main lesson of Chornobyl.

The lesson is sad, painful and tragic. Nevertheless, we must learn it.

Today, I would like to reiterate the idea declared during the 1997 session of the United Nations General Assembly - the idea of establishing the Ecological Security Council of the United Nations, the International Ecological Court and the International Ecological Bank.

I believe the time has come to put this proposal on a practical foundation. That would enable us to act together, in a concerted and coordinated manner, to concentrate the costs and resources when some countries are not able to cope on their own with the consequences of natural and technogenic disasters.

Ukraine stands up for signing the convention on the creation of an international mechanism of ecological monitoring and control, and for the implementation of a range of other measures that would guarantee healthy and clean living conditions for all people in every corner of the world.

On our part, we are ready to freely and generally transmit to the international community our unique, although very bitter, experience gained over the years of elimination of the consequences of the Chornobyl catastrophe.

We propose that the nuclear power plant that is being shut down and the territory adjacent to it be used as a test ground for an international scientific-research center to work out technologies of nuclear safety improvement, alleviation and elimination of the consequences of catastrophes at nuclear plants, and rehabilitation of the environment.

As we approach the shutdown of the Chornobyl nuclear power plant, we are renouncing even the most basic necessities. We are not awaiting applause, but constructive attention and cooperation. We demand not tips or alms, but equality, respect and understanding.

We are convinced that the solidarity of nations and states, and the humanism of contemporary civilization will not abandon Ukraine without assistance. We are grateful in advance to all who will render it.

Mankind approaches the future while looking back to the past. This is the unchanging law of history.

What has already happened cannot be changed. But, at the same time, it cannot be forgotten.

Then let the word "Chornobyl," in the name of coming generations, become an instant and severe reminder of responsibility for all that is created by wisdom and made by hands.

Let December 15, 2000, be taken by the world as one of the clear manifestations of this responsibility.

Let us listen to the words of the Holy Scriptures that came to us from the deepness of the ages: "A wise person knows his own path ..."

To conclude this message I express confidence and hope that states and peoples - all mankind - will have enough wisdom, will and responsibility to keep moving ahead on a reasonable and well-thought-out path free of such ominous landmarks as Chornobyl.

Let it be so from now on and forever.

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