Nuclear Waste
Transport Bound for Disputed Storage Site Crosses German Border
November 21, 2005 — By Melissa Eddy, Associated Press
BERLIN — A shipment of nuclear waste
bound for a disputed storage site in the north of the country crossed
Sunday into Germany, where thousands of police were guarding its route
from anti-nuclear demonstrators.
About a dozen activists greeted the train as it crossed the border from
France without incident, said Franz Blang, a police spokesman in the
town of Woerth. The train was later temporarily blocked by a group of
activists while passing through the southwestern state of
Baden-Wuerttemberg, authorities there said.
Earlier Sunday, the train was temporarily delayed after dozens of French
protesters threw firecrackers onto the rails.
Demonstrations by French nuclear activists remained peaceful, however,
as they commemorated a protester who was hit and killed by a train
during a similar shipment of nuclear waste a year ago.
On Saturday, protesters in the German town of Lueneburg, 50 kilometers
(30 miles) southeast of Hamburg, threw rocks at police.
Lueneburg is on the stretch of road that is the last leg the nuclear
waste will take on its route from a reprocessing plant in La Hague,
France, to a temporary storage facility in Gorleben, Germany and
traditionally a gathering point for demonstrators.
Yet authorities said participation among the anti-nuclear demonstrators
was down to only just more than 3,000. The number of demonstrations has
also dropped to 28 demonstrations, from the 100 that were organized in
2003, they said.
The shipment left Saturday from a reprocessing plant in the Normandy
coastal town of La Hague to a hotly contested storage facility in
Gorleben, Germany.
The annual waste transport, due to arrive in Gorleben late Monday, has
become a favorite target of anti-nuclear demonstrators, thousands of
whom are expected to protest along the route in the coming week.
Some 3,100 people turned out in the town of Hitzacker to protest the
waste storage, police said, with 40 tractors accompanying the
protesters. The storage facility is disliked by local farmers who say
they fear having radioactive waste in the area undermines the reputation
of their produce.
German authorities have dedicated 10,000 officers to patrolling the
route before the transport's arrival.
Source: Associated Press
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