Anti Nuclear Hunger Strike at Koodankulam, south India

Koodankulam Updates:


The non-violent hunger strike at Idinthakarai has entered its 9th day but the state and central governments have turned a blind eye and deaf ear to the demands of the people. In the meantime, the situation of many of the hunger strikers continues to deteriorate to an alarming level. More than 15,000 people have been gathering every day for the past 8 days from 30 odd villages and towns around Koodankulam from three districts, viz. Kanyakumari, Thoothukudi and Tirunelveli. The protest has spread to many parts of Tamil Nadu and Kerala with southern Tamil Nadu turning out to be the epicenter of protests. For the eighth day in succession, fishermen, farmers, manual laborers, merchants of the area did not go to work while students have boycotted educational institutions. Shops remain closed in many places around Idinthakarai.

The men and women who gather everyday to participate in the protest also fast throughout the day. People of Hindu, Muslims and Christian faiths and of all major caste groups are involved in the hunger strike and the relay fast by tens of thousands of people. Leaders of most of the major political parties have come and expressed their support to the protest and a few of them have also announced specific protest programs.

The authorities have foisted false cases on 500 odd people and a few have been put in jail. A huge police battalion has been posted near Idinthakarai and neighboring villages. Road blocks have been created and public transport has been suspended by authorities who are preventing people from coming to the protest in all possible ways.

With the swiftly deteriorating health situation of the fasters and lack of any serious or official initiative on the part of the governments to talk, some people are losing their patience. Justice V.R. Krishna Iyer has issued a call to the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister to intervene immediately and has also asked the movement to continue the protesters without putting the lives of the people in danger or resorting to violence. Medha Patkar is joining the protest today. The protest needs intervention from eminent and respected personalities like you and solidarity and support from groups across the country to force the governments to act and save the lives of fasters and to maintain a peaceful atmosphere.

K.Sahadevan    from Koodankulam

SOUTH ASIANS AGAINST NUKES (SAAN):

An informal information platform for activists and scholars concerned about the dangers of Nuclearisation in South Asia

http://s-asians-against-nukes.org/

Anti Nuclear Protest at Koodankulam, India

India began to build these nuclear power stations in 1991 in Tamil Nadu, Southern India.
Recently local people, many of whom are fishermen, realising that their livelihoods are at stake, are protesting. They fear that the radioactive waste discharged from the reactor will contaminate the fish. They also fear a Fukushima-type disaster since Tamil Nadu has been hit by tsunamis.

 

Nuclear Waste and the Green Party

Well at least the Green Party care what happens to our nuclear waste.
They may not have a solution to the nuclear waste problem, but then who has? There is no satisfactory solution. But clearly burying it underground, out of site, out of mind, is not the right thing to do. Geologists have already carried out surveys in Cumbria and come to the conclusion that nuclear waste buried there would leak radioactivity out into the ground water. The current government has decided to ignore geological reports and push ahead with deep geological disposal.

But the Green Party proposed at their Autumn Conference:

"We call on policy committee to develop a policy on legacy high and intermediate level radioactive waste in time for Spring Conference 2012. The policy to be based on best environmental practice, not political expediency We also call on Conference to support Allerdale and Copeland Green Party and other local groups, including West Cumbria Friends of the Earth, Radiation Free Lakeland, and CORE in their work to oppose the deep geological disposal plans and to call for alternative disposal methods to be revisited. In particular lobbying local authorities not to proceed to the next stage of the Managing Radioactive Waste Safely (MRWS)process (January 2012), at which stage the right of withdrawal would be severely compromised proposed"

More Power to the Green Party