Activists of the humanist organisation, World without Wars and Violence will be in the streets of Budapest, Hungary on Monday 11th of March to call on the government to take steps to phase out the use of nuclear energy claiming that it is not “clean, green or cheap energy”.
In the centre of Budapest, in Déak Square campaigners will be handing out leaflets touching on four themes: the unhealthy attachment that the government has to nuclear energy, the effect of a nuclear accident at the Paks nuclear power plant (the only one in Hungary), the relative cost of nuclear energy compared to wind energy and the cost of the Fukushima clean up.
In Hungary, public opposition to nuclear energy is very low with opinion polls showing almost 3 quarters of the population are in favour and in a government vote in 2009 on the plans to extend the Paks facility 330 MPs voted in favour with only 6 opposed and 10 abstentions.
World without Wars claims that this is due to a lack of public education about the issues. Their spokesperson, Lorenzo Molinari said, “Hardly anyone in Hungary knows about the threat we face from nuclear energy. Even after Fukushima people are quite happy to live with nuclear energy. The electricity company brochure explaining the expansion plans is filled with photos of cute animals and flowers promoting an image that is absolutely not true.”
In a press statement World without Wars said:
The radioactive waste created by nuclear energy is dangerous for tens of thousands of years. How can we create such a legacy for our children? We owe it to future generations to invest everything we can in renewable energy and in the means to ensure that the nuclear waste we already have will absolutely never get into the environment or fall into the hands of terrorists seeking materials for bombs.
The nuclear industry creates a myth that it is clean, green and cheap. It is none of these things. It creates nuclear waste in volumes that we cannot cope with, the entire lifecycle of nuclear fuel leads to the spread of radiation into the environment and frequently the exploitation of indigenous populations, and the production of nuclear energy is heavily subsidised by central government.
When one nation is capable of poisoning the entire planet, the consequences are a form of violence that we cannot remain silent about.
At the end of the street activity handing out leaflets the activists will hold a humanist ceremony to commemorate the nearly 18,000 victims of the earthquake and the people of Japan whose lives have been devastated by the Fukushima nuclear disaster.
More information about the event can be found on their facebook event, here.
