Thirty years ago, on April 26, 1989, Ukraine commemorated the third anniversary of the 1986 Chornobyl nuclear power station disaster with an official rally in Kyiv at the Dynamo soccer stadium that attracted an estimated crowd of tens of thousands.
Organized by the Zelenyi Svit (Green World) party, the gathering was addressed by Ukrainian writers and cultural activists, including Dmytro Pavlychko and Les Taniuk, as well as workers from Chornobyl and “heroes of the Chornobyl tragedy,” known as “liquidators,” who were the first on the scene in the initial response and clean-up of the area. Many of these liquidators died or suffered long-term health consequences as a result of exposure to radiation.
The rally continued with a memorial candlelit march down Kyiv’s main thoroughfare, Khreshchatyk. No incidents were reported as young people processed through the city center as they held lit candles.
Participants urged the Ukrainian SSR’s Council of Ministers to raise the question of the inadvisability of the operation of the Chornobyl nuclear power station and halt new power-generating facilities at operating nuclear power stations.
Speakers at the rally called for making the 30-kilometer zone surrounding the Chornobyl plant as an international research ground and mentioned “the need to raise before the republican Supreme Soviet the question of holding a referendum regarding further development of nuclear power engineering on the territory of Ukraine.” Some of the speakers also demanded an end to “press censorship” related to the nuclear accident.
In Lviv, nearly 15,000 people attended a similar rally on April 26 to mark the Chornobyl disaster.
On April 16, 1989, nearly 20,000 people attended a memorial moleben that was served at the Church of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary for the victims of Chornobyl. Following the service, prayers were offered for the children of Chornobyl, those resettled from the 30-kilometer exclusion zone around the affected area, as well as for those who were responsible for the tragedy.
The Soviet government, in its decision to mark the third anniversary of Chornobyl, issued new directives on April 26 to curb information that could be reported by the press about nuclear plant accidents. Soviet journalists were angered by the move, noting that it was not in line with the glasnost policies of the Gorbachev regime that were meant to create a degree of openness in the Soviet information sphere. The new curbs designated as classified nearly all reports on nuclear and conventional power accidents, breakdowns and contaminations of any severity.
The New York Times reporter Esther B. Fein noted:
“A decree so sharply curtailing the powers of the press is especially startling in the atmosphere of glasnost, or candor, that has been encouraged in the four-year leadership of Mikhail S. Gorbachev.
“The directive comes at a time when the government has been trying to promote the use of atomic energy amid the growth of an anti-nuclear movement born of fear that the full truth about what happened at Chornobyl is yet to be revealed.”
It was not clear if the directive would affect reporting by foreign journalists, but the curbs included the transmission of prohibited materials abroad. The directive covered prohibitions on reporting about failures and fires at power plants or construction sites, and on accidents that caused damage, death and even “non-catastrophic environmental contamination.”
At the time, reports of radiation-related birth defects in the contaminated areas of Ukraine and Belarus in the Soviet press were beginning to cause increased anxiety among local residents.
Today, there are documented studies of immediate and latent health effects and ongoing consequences as a result of the Chornobyl disaster.
Sources: “Official rally in Kiev marks Chornobyl disaster anniversary,” The Ukrainian Weekly, May 7, 1989; “20,000 in Lviv recall Chornobyl,” and “Soviets curb release of information on accidents at nuclear stations,” The Ukrainian Weekly, April 30, 1989.