Greenpeace urges Ireland to redirect nuclear shipment

By Andrew Bushe

DUBLIN — As a controversial nuclear shipment approaches the Irish Sea this week on its way back from Japan to the Sellafield reprocessing plant in Britain, the Irish government’s high-level post-Sept. 11 Task Force on Emergency Planning is meeting to discuss the situation.

The environmental group Greenpeace has called on the government to deploy the Navy to ensure the shipment of plutonium mixed oxide (MOX) fuel does not enter Irish waters.

The Japanese rejected the MOX fuel and sent it back after Sellafield’s owners, British Nuclear Fuels, admitted falsifying safety data.

The Greenpeace Warrior vessel has arrived in Dublin to organize protests against the shipment on the final leg of its journey.

“The question of the MOX shipment is on the Task Force’s agenda,” said a spokesman for Defense Minister Michael Smith, who chairs the body confirmed.

The shipment is expected to follow the same route back up the Irish Sea that it took when it left. This will keep it in international and British waters.

“They probably won’t be within 40 or 50 miles of our 12-mile territorial limit, which is as far we control under international law,” a government source said.

Greenpeace said two “plutonium” ships, the Pacific Pintail and its escort, the Pacific Teal, are currently in the Atlantic approaching the Irish Sea.

“These dangerous nuclear ships will be in the Irish Sea within weeks, so the government must send a further signal to Britain that these transports and the plutonium industry they are part of is completely unacceptable,” John Bowler, Greenpeace International’s representative in Ireland, said at a press conference in Dublin last week.

“Greenpeace is recommending that the Irish government deploy naval vessels for the arrival of the nuclear transport to guarantee that armed vessels do not enter Irish waters and also to ensure the safety of the Irish Nuclear Free Seas Flotilla, which is planning to protest against the shipment.”

Greenpeace said that in July, British Nuclear Fuels (BNLF) ignored opposition from South Pacific island nations that the shipment must not violate their 200-mile Exclusive Economic Zone.

“The Irish government has taken legal action to prevent nuclear transports, and has voiced strong opposition to it threatening the Irish Sea,” Bowler said.

“Governments around the world have learned through experience not to trust BNFL, its decaying industry and the British government. The Irish government has more reason than most not to trust them. The daily existence of Sellafield is all they need to remind them.”

Shaun Burnie, a Greenpeace nuclear campaigner, said the “dangerous trade in bomb material” is not sustainable.

“BNFL is bankrupt and the Japanese nuclear industry is awash in plutonium for which it has no use,” he said. “The billions wasted in supporting this industry need to be switched to clean and renewable energy.”

Burnie said the British government is propping up an industry that is being increasingly rejected by the international community and increasing the risk of nuclear proliferation and terrorist attack.

“In contrast to Sellafield and plutonium shipments, windmills are not on any terrorist target list,” he said.