Zhenisgul Konarova
Executive Secretary
International Anti-Nuclear Movement "Nevada-Semipalatinsk"
Kazakhstan
There is no more serious pollution than the contamination of Kazakhstan where its people and land are affected by radiation and toxic matter caused by the nuclear industry and by the manufacturing and testing of nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction.
Official medical statistics show a major fall of the demographic index. For example, mortality, including infant mortality, and natural growth rates. It is particularly a matter of concern that there are more than five million cases of children's diseases.
Tumors, hereditary diseases and other serious diseases are increasing. Victims of these diseases are among the third generation population. They suffer from leukemia and mental diseases. The number of suicides is also increasing. This proves that living conditions are in a crisis in the zones directly affected by nuclear test explosions. Vast acreage of cultivation were contaminated by high levels of radiation, and have become what might be described as a nuclear lake.
About one and half million people have frequently been exposed to various levels of radiation.
Seventy thousand of them have been exposed to an excessively large dose of radiation. About 27,000 people need preventive medical measures.
As far as nuclear weapons and nuclear energy are concerned, Kazakhstan is a very unique country.
Our country has uranium mines, which serve to produce fuel for nuclear power generation. Nuclear test explosions took place. Radioactive waste has been buried underground. The dismantling of SS-20 missiles of the Soviet Union also took place in Kazakhstan.
We have thus survived ecological warfare.
In Kazakhstan, nuclear explosions have taken place more frequently than any other place in the world, making the country a seismic focus of serious pollution.
The landfill of radioactive waste at the former test site in Semipalatinsk is a matter of grave concern. How can you ensure that the former test site, which has cracks caused by nuclear text explosions that took place for forty years, is sealed up.
Since the nuclear industry found its place in Kazakhstan, 4 hundred million tons of radioactive waste have been buried in hundreds of places within an area of 35 square kilometers.
The Third Global Anti-Nuclear Conference was held In the Kazakhstan capital of Astana from May 17 to May 20 this year.
I would like to draw your attention to what the conference achieved
as summarized in a booklet. This is signed by Orjas Sleimeinov who represents
the international anti-nuclear movement "Nevada-Semipalatinsk."
We cite the following from the 3rd Congress of Global Anti-Nuclear
Alliance:
1. Considering the data of international research on health conditions
of local residents having suffered from damage caused by weapons of mass
destruction, the Conference proposes to designate the Semipalatinsk region
as a special model region of restoration of nature devastated by tests
of weapons of mass destruction, which is to be placed under observation
as a scientific experimental site:
2. Many countries have already adopted legislation for solving problems
at a nation level. The Conference proposes to discuss legislation
of international law "for protection of people in all regions on the earth
having suffered from nuclear (chemical, biological) arms and nuclear power
industries", viewing this as a matter involving the whole human race;
3. To organize and hold a "round table"with participation of leaders
of India, Pakistan, and other "broder"countries at Almaty in 2001.
We cite the following from the message conveyed to U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan from the 3rd Congress of Global Anti-Nuclear Alliance.
The sole answer obvious from laws of formal logic is that none of the countries should be entitled to possess arms of mass destruction such as nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons.
If even only one country is allowed to, then that right is extended to all other countries.
Not to give permission to any one and to make illegitimate the weapons of mass destruction – this is the only right way to save the human race.
However, is there any force capable of causing the five nuclear powers to abandon nuclear deployment?
What we can do is only to set our hope on peoples' and big power leaders' sound ways of thinking, as well as untiring efforts of the United Nations and international organizations. Among others, our great expectation is directed to the Global Anti-Nuclear Alliance.
The 3rd Conference of the Global Anti-Nuclear Alliance proposes a complete nuclear disarmament that seems feasible:
1st stage: The United States and Russia reduce military forces to an agreed minimum level. This has been attempted in the late 1990s, and can be advanced in the case where the international community accepts the bilateral agreement between the United States and Russia as a part of a treaty for "complete ban on arms of mass destruction”.
2nd stage: Nuclear weapons lose their status as a means of national defense. Weapons targeting the human race become referred to without adjectives indicative of nations, such as "American","Russian", "Chinese"
The military forces in the world are reduced to a minimum agreed level (to several tens of nuclear heads), and are placed under the legal control by the U.N. Security Council as weapons against the human race. In other words, they are used as a means for deterring the forces that might violate a treaty for a complete ban on arms of mass destruction.
The final document of the Conference including the whole contents is attached to our report.
Dear friends,
It is time to seek a complete ban on and the abolition of nuclear weapons. Let us take actions together for the immediate realization of a complete ban on the use and stockpiling of nuclear weapons. This is the Japanese and Kazakh victims'cry from the bottom of our hearts.
Let us strive for this aim!
For a 21st century without nuclear weapons!