NSW: Closed nuclear forum a farce: protesters

AAP General News (Australia)
12-14-2001
NSW: Closed nuclear forum a farce: protesters

SYDNEY, Dec 14 AAP - A forum into the construction of a new nuclear reactor in Sydney's
south was branded a farce today by anti-nuclear protesters.

Sutherland Shire councillor Genevieve Rankin, who heads the council's nuclear committee,
said the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency (ARPANSA) invited the
council to address the forum but the public was excluded.

"This is a farce. There is no public hearing or rights to the public in this process,"

Ms Rankin told AAP.

About 50 Greenpeace protesters, wearing bright orange T-shirts saying "Nuclear Never
Safe", listened to two rappers on stilts singing nuclear protest songs outside the forum
in Sydney's CBD.

Greenpeace nuclear campaigner Stephen Campbell said he had concerns about how the forum
was run and he believed the new reactor was unnecessary.

He said the reactor would produce waste for the next 40 years, threaten the environment,
cost half a billion dollars and pose a terrorist risk.

ARPANSA should widen the public forum process, he said.

"They should be listening to the concerns of the people, which are many," he said.

AAP mk/gmw/sal/las/sb

KEYWORD: REACTOR PROTEST

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