Difference between revisions of "Baltic Sea Info Tour/Belarus"

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{| style="float:right;"
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|'''Images of Anti-Nuclear activities<br/>in Belarus:'''
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|-
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|[[Image:BalticTour Belarus PressConference.jpg|Press Conference in Minsk|thumb|right]]
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|-
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|[[Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 7.jpg|"Building nuclear power plant in the Republic of Belarus. preparatory period. Preparation of the construction area. construction period: start - October 2009, end - December 2011"|thumb|right]]
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|-
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|[[Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 9.jpg|Surprising visit - Infotour inspection of the Belarusian NPP construction site...|thumb|right]]
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|-
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|[[Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 11.jpg|The operator actually had no construction permission yet...|thumb|right]]
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|-
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|[[Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 14.jpg|Excavator on the construction site|thumb|right]]
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|-
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|[[Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 16.jpg|Borehole No. 1 in the center of the field|thumb|right]]
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|-
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|[[Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPrailwayConstruction 1.jpg|Contrcution of a railway connection to the NPP|thumb|right]]
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|-
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|[[Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPinformationCenter 1.jpg|NPP Propaganda Center (officially "information center") in Astraviec|thumb|right]]
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|-
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|[[Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPinformationCenter 2.jpg|Documents of the Environmental Impact Assessment in the NPP Info Center|thumb|right]]
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|}
 
'''[[Action:Infotour Around The Baltic Sea|<<= back to the ''Baltic Sea Info Tour'' main page]]'''
 
'''[[Action:Infotour Around The Baltic Sea|<<= back to the ''Baltic Sea Info Tour'' main page]]'''
 
__NOTOC__
 
__NOTOC__
 
== Tour Stop in Belarus ==
 
== Tour Stop in Belarus ==
'''Belarus''' is the most affected country by the fallout of the reactor explosion in Chernobyl 1986<ref>http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Belarus&oldid=357571413 as at April 25, 2010</ref>. It has no nuclear power plants, but the authoritarian regime forces the construction of its first NPP by the border to Lithuania. Doing action in Belarus is mostly illegal; the anti-nuclear activists living there are confronted by massive repression.
+
'''Belarus''' is the most affected country by the fallout of the reactor explosion in Chernobyl 1986<ref>http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Belarus&oldid=357571413 as at April 25, 2010</ref>. It has no nuclear power plants, but the Belarusian government forces the construction of its first [[NPP]] by the border to Lithuania. Doing action in Belarus is not allowed by the government; the anti-nuclear activists living there are confronted with massive repression.
  
We can't publish the venues of the ''Baltic Sea Info Tour'' for protection reasons against repression and violance. Anyway, the infotour will stop from '''July 15-17''' in Belarus. We will provide a '''public information event''', a '''public street action''' and a '''regional network gathering''' here.
+
In Belarus the main goal of the ''Baltic Sea Info Tour'' is to educate people about the threats of nuclear power, because of a lack of independent information at the same time with massive pro-nuclear state propaganda. The infotour stopped from '''July 15-17''' in Belarus. We provided '''public information events''' and a '''[[Baltic Sea Info Tour/Network Gathering|regional network gathering]]''' here. ''Those participants who couldn't join the infotour stop in Belarus had an alternative stop in [[Baltic Sea Info Tour/Vilnius|Vilnius]] with activities and afterwards resting days for as well the participants of the Belarusian stop as well as those of the Vilnius stop.''
  
  
 
=== Local contact ===
 
=== Local contact ===
'''...''' <span style="color:red">coming soon</span>
+
'''Antinuclear Campaign'''
* phone: '''+375 ...''' <span style="color:red">coming soon</span>
 
 
* email: '''[mailto:belarus.baltic-tourATnuclear-heritage.net belarus.baltic-tour AT nuclear-heritage.net]'''{{Spamprotection}}
 
* email: '''[mailto:belarus.baltic-tourATnuclear-heritage.net belarus.baltic-tour AT nuclear-heritage.net]'''{{Spamprotection}}
  
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* '''Wednesday''' ''(Jul 14)'': travelling from the previous stop in [[Baltic Sea Info Tour/Riga|Riga]] to Belarus
 
* '''Wednesday''' ''(Jul 14)'': travelling from the previous stop in [[Baltic Sea Info Tour/Riga|Riga]] to Belarus
 
* '''Thursday - Saturday''' ''(Jul 15-17)'': STOP in Belarus
 
* '''Thursday - Saturday''' ''(Jul 15-17)'': STOP in Belarus
* '''Sunday''' ''(Jul 18)'': travelling to the next stop in [[Baltic Sea Info Tour/Jezioro Zarnowieckie|Poland]]
+
* '''Sunday''' ''(Jul 18)'': travelling to [[Baltic Sea Info Tour/Vilnius|Vilnius]] for having two resting days and afterwards to the next stop in [[Baltic Sea Info Tour/Jezioro Zarnowieckie|Jezioro Żarnowieckie]]
  
  
=== Other Information about the Belarus Stop ===
+
=== Report from Belarus ===
*  <span style="color:red">coming soon</span>
+
We travelled to Belarus, a very symbolic stop because Belarus is the country which is most affected by the Chernobyl tragedy. Regardless of that, the Belarusian authorities want to build a new NPP. The site is 15km from the town Astraviec (Астравец) not far from the Lithuanian border.
  
 +
About 15 people took part in this stop. They came from different places in Belarus, Russia (Murmansk, St.Petersburg and Moscow), Finland, Denmark and Germany. Every evening we were joined by local people. Not everyone who wanted to was able to join this stop because of the visa application process. Some people were in Vilnius during the same time and had actions there. Still, it was a very interesting part of the tour.
  
 +
Belarus is a very peaceful, clean and nice country at first blush, but with a difficult political atmosphere and limited freedoms. We didn't have a public action because it's almost impossible to do this without conflict with the authorities in Belarus. During our three-day stay we visited many natural and historical places and met local people who are against the NPP because it would harm these places.
 +
 +
==== July 15 ====
 +
Our first activity was a press conference in Minsk on Thursday morning. Due to summertime, we only had a few journalists who were actually attending. There were 5 speakers: Falk Beyer introduced the Nuclear Baltic Sea Info Tour, Ulla Klötzer talked about issues with final storage of radioactive waste that NPPs produce, Per Hegelund talked about the radioactivity of the Baltic Sea, Georgy Lepin explained about the dangers of nuclear power in general and Tanya Novikova explained more specific things about the situation in Belarus.
 +
 +
In the afternoon we travelled to the region in the north of Belarus where the NPP is about to be built. We could already see the beautiful landscape of this country and our vehicle passed the first wind power plant of Belarus. In the evening at camp we introduced the "Baltic Sea Info Tour" to everyone who was there, introduced ourselves to each other and discussed about our program.
 +
 +
==== July 16 ====
 +
Very early in the morning at 5 AM we got up and went to the place where the construction of the NPP is planned to see (without being disturbed by construction workers) what it looks like. They actually shouldn't have started construction work as they don't have a permission yet, but we saw the foundations had already been started, and there was a signpost informing that this is the construction site.
 +
 +
Then we visited the "NPP Information Center" in Astraviec and had an interesting and at the same time stupid/funny discussion with the personnel there. Firstly we want to say that this is a disinformation center, it's a propagandistic center. Here we could only find positive words about nuclear energy. Nothing about nuclear waste, nothing about leukaemia, nothing about alternative sources of energy. Only modern, clean and safe nuclear energy...
 +
 +
The PR employee there tried to answer our questions, but didn't seem very confident: After a break he got help from two men directly involved in the construction of the NPP. One of them was the vice chairman. One of the most telling comments of the day was made in a discussion about nuclear waste. They said that they are going to send it to Russia. One of us asked about the consequences for the 25,000 coming generations and then one of them said something along the lines of "it's going to be the consequences of the people in Russia". They seem to deal with this very responsibly...
 +
 +
Later the expert Andrey Ozharovsky criticized every poster that was on the walls of this center, while the NPP employees were forced to justify themselves and looked very pitiful.
 +
 +
==== July 17 ====
 +
We heard a talk from Ulla Klötzer (Women against Nuclear Power, Finland) about the history of the anti-nuclear movement in Finland and a lecture from Andrey Ozharovsky (Ecodefense, Russia). Yuriy, a local, gave a presentation about nature protection areas that would be in the surrounding area of the NPP. Yuriy had openly voiced his opinion that the NPP is dangerous for the protected areas and was fired from his job for this. Then we had a presentation of local anti-nuclear initiatives and their work in Belarus and of the anti-nuclear work of the regional organization of "Priroda i Molodezh" from Murmansk (Russia), we saw anti-nuclear films and discussed a lot, switching over to a general planning of how to develop resistance in Belarus.
 +
 +
Being openly against the NPP in Belarus is quite courageous, because when you are against something the government is doing it means that you are against the government in general - the bitter truth of an authoritarian regime.
 +
 +
After three full days of activity and connecting to Belarusian activists we moved on to Vilnius for two days of rest and were in Poland from July 21-23.
 +
 +
 +
== Media Coverage ==
 +
* [http://de.indymedia.org/2010/08/288246.shtml Info tour in Belarus] ''- Indymedia Germany, August 23, 2010'' <small><small>English</small></small>
 +
* [http://ru.delfi.lt/abroad/belorussia/zarubezhnye-eksperty-posetili-ostroveckuyu-ploschadku-dlya-aes.d?id=34655609&rsslink=true Зарубежные эксперты посетили площадку для АЭС в Островце] ''- article about the NPP construction site in Belarus, July 20, 2010'' <small><small>Russian</small></small>
 +
* [http://naviny.by/rubrics/society/2010/07/20/ic_articles_116_169091/ Зарубежные эксперты побывали «в гостях» у белорусской АЭС] ''- article about inspection of the Belarusian NPP construction site, July 20, 2010'' <small><small>Russian</small></small>
 +
* [http://euroradio.fm/ru/1276/news/50194/ Датский эксперт: Белорусская АЭС будет загрязнять Балтийское море] ''- article about the infotour, July 15, 2010'' <small><small>
  
  
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[[Category: Projects]]
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<gallery caption="Sample gallery" widths="100px" heights="100px" perrow="6">
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus GateOfMinsk.jpg|"Gate of Minsk" - a famous image of the capital of Belarus
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 1.jpg|Pictures from the NPP construction site
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 2.jpg|Construction vehicles
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 3.jpg|Containers village
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 4.jpg|Activists spread over the whole area to document what is happening here...
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 5.jpg|A big area is going to be destroyed for the nuclear power plant...
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 6.jpg|Car park
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 8.jpg|"Building nuclear power plant in the Republic of Belarus. preparatory period. Preparation of the construction area. construction period: start - October 2009, end - December 2011"
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 10.jpg|But the operator actually didn't have a permission of the NPP construction yet!
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 12.jpg|This would cause difficult discussions for them later in the "NPP information center"...
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 13.jpg|Construction of a ditch
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 15.jpg|Marker on the construction site
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 17.jpg|The activists arrived in the very early morning when no workers were on the site yet
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 18.jpg|Heavy clouds above the NPP construction site - does it mean anything?
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 19.jpg|But there is also some sun shining on the activists... :)
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 20.jpg|Anyway, our appearance irritaded the nuclear operator, as well as our difficult questions about the NPP and problems connected to it in their propaganda center
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPconstructionSite 21.jpg|Another water device on the construction site...
 +
Image:BalticTour Belarus NPPrailwayConstruction 3.jpg|Short stop for photo shooting
 +
</gallery>
 +
 
 +
 
 +
[[Category: Baltic Tour Stops]]
 
[[Category: Events]]
 
[[Category: Events]]
 
[[Category: Belarus]]
 
[[Category: Belarus]]
Line 34: Line 106:
 
[[Category: 2010/07/16]]
 
[[Category: 2010/07/16]]
 
[[Category: 2010/07/17]]
 
[[Category: 2010/07/17]]
 +
[[Category: Gallery]]
 +
[[Category: Ecodefense]]
 +
[[Category: English]]

Latest revision as of 03:51, 21 July 2015

Images of Anti-Nuclear activities
in Belarus:
Press Conference in Minsk
"Building nuclear power plant in the Republic of Belarus. preparatory period. Preparation of the construction area. construction period: start - October 2009, end - December 2011"
Surprising visit - Infotour inspection of the Belarusian NPP construction site...
The operator actually had no construction permission yet...
Excavator on the construction site
Borehole No. 1 in the center of the field
Contrcution of a railway connection to the NPP
NPP Propaganda Center (officially "information center") in Astraviec
Documents of the Environmental Impact Assessment in the NPP Info Center

<<= back to the Baltic Sea Info Tour main page

Tour Stop in Belarus

Belarus is the most affected country by the fallout of the reactor explosion in Chernobyl 1986[1]. It has no nuclear power plants, but the Belarusian government forces the construction of its first NPP by the border to Lithuania. Doing action in Belarus is not allowed by the government; the anti-nuclear activists living there are confronted with massive repression.

In Belarus the main goal of the Baltic Sea Info Tour is to educate people about the threats of nuclear power, because of a lack of independent information at the same time with massive pro-nuclear state propaganda. The infotour stopped from July 15-17 in Belarus. We provided public information events and a regional network gathering here. Those participants who couldn't join the infotour stop in Belarus had an alternative stop in Vilnius with activities and afterwards resting days for as well the participants of the Belarusian stop as well as those of the Vilnius stop.


Local contact

Antinuclear Campaign


Travel Schedule of the Belarus Stop

  • Wednesday (Jul 14): travelling from the previous stop in Riga to Belarus
  • Thursday - Saturday (Jul 15-17): STOP in Belarus
  • Sunday (Jul 18): travelling to Vilnius for having two resting days and afterwards to the next stop in Jezioro Żarnowieckie


Report from Belarus

We travelled to Belarus, a very symbolic stop because Belarus is the country which is most affected by the Chernobyl tragedy. Regardless of that, the Belarusian authorities want to build a new NPP. The site is 15km from the town Astraviec (Астравец) not far from the Lithuanian border.

About 15 people took part in this stop. They came from different places in Belarus, Russia (Murmansk, St.Petersburg and Moscow), Finland, Denmark and Germany. Every evening we were joined by local people. Not everyone who wanted to was able to join this stop because of the visa application process. Some people were in Vilnius during the same time and had actions there. Still, it was a very interesting part of the tour.

Belarus is a very peaceful, clean and nice country at first blush, but with a difficult political atmosphere and limited freedoms. We didn't have a public action because it's almost impossible to do this without conflict with the authorities in Belarus. During our three-day stay we visited many natural and historical places and met local people who are against the NPP because it would harm these places.

July 15

Our first activity was a press conference in Minsk on Thursday morning. Due to summertime, we only had a few journalists who were actually attending. There were 5 speakers: Falk Beyer introduced the Nuclear Baltic Sea Info Tour, Ulla Klötzer talked about issues with final storage of radioactive waste that NPPs produce, Per Hegelund talked about the radioactivity of the Baltic Sea, Georgy Lepin explained about the dangers of nuclear power in general and Tanya Novikova explained more specific things about the situation in Belarus.

In the afternoon we travelled to the region in the north of Belarus where the NPP is about to be built. We could already see the beautiful landscape of this country and our vehicle passed the first wind power plant of Belarus. In the evening at camp we introduced the "Baltic Sea Info Tour" to everyone who was there, introduced ourselves to each other and discussed about our program.

July 16

Very early in the morning at 5 AM we got up and went to the place where the construction of the NPP is planned to see (without being disturbed by construction workers) what it looks like. They actually shouldn't have started construction work as they don't have a permission yet, but we saw the foundations had already been started, and there was a signpost informing that this is the construction site.

Then we visited the "NPP Information Center" in Astraviec and had an interesting and at the same time stupid/funny discussion with the personnel there. Firstly we want to say that this is a disinformation center, it's a propagandistic center. Here we could only find positive words about nuclear energy. Nothing about nuclear waste, nothing about leukaemia, nothing about alternative sources of energy. Only modern, clean and safe nuclear energy...

The PR employee there tried to answer our questions, but didn't seem very confident: After a break he got help from two men directly involved in the construction of the NPP. One of them was the vice chairman. One of the most telling comments of the day was made in a discussion about nuclear waste. They said that they are going to send it to Russia. One of us asked about the consequences for the 25,000 coming generations and then one of them said something along the lines of "it's going to be the consequences of the people in Russia". They seem to deal with this very responsibly...

Later the expert Andrey Ozharovsky criticized every poster that was on the walls of this center, while the NPP employees were forced to justify themselves and looked very pitiful.

July 17

We heard a talk from Ulla Klötzer (Women against Nuclear Power, Finland) about the history of the anti-nuclear movement in Finland and a lecture from Andrey Ozharovsky (Ecodefense, Russia). Yuriy, a local, gave a presentation about nature protection areas that would be in the surrounding area of the NPP. Yuriy had openly voiced his opinion that the NPP is dangerous for the protected areas and was fired from his job for this. Then we had a presentation of local anti-nuclear initiatives and their work in Belarus and of the anti-nuclear work of the regional organization of "Priroda i Molodezh" from Murmansk (Russia), we saw anti-nuclear films and discussed a lot, switching over to a general planning of how to develop resistance in Belarus.

Being openly against the NPP in Belarus is quite courageous, because when you are against something the government is doing it means that you are against the government in general - the bitter truth of an authoritarian regime.

After three full days of activity and connecting to Belarusian activists we moved on to Vilnius for two days of rest and were in Poland from July 21-23.


Media Coverage


  1. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Belarus&oldid=357571413 as at April 25, 2010
  2. For protection against automatical email address robots searching for addresses to send spam to them this email address has been made unreadable for them. To get a correct mail address you have to displace "AT" by the @-symbol.