2024-06-04 20:47:29
Writer: Leila Tariverdieva
Final week, a delegation from French Polynesia visited Baku. Those that arrived aren’t members of the protest motion, however representatives of the management of parliament and the ruling get together. Officers. The go to made France fidget uncomfortably, which was not shocking. They’re already frightened by the state of affairs in New Caledonia, which they take into account to be a consequence of the “intrigues” of Azerbaijan. Now the Elysee Palace has been disadvantaged of sleep by the statements made in Baku by the Polynesians. And Paris has one thing to fret about. The issues that the residents of French Polynesia are experiencing aren’t far-fetched, however actual. They weren’t invented by Azerbaijani propaganda, they have been created by France for the islanders. She did this, as at all times, cynically and with full contempt for the destiny of the indigenous folks of her colony, superbly referred to as an “abroad territory.”
In 2016, then-French President François Hollande, throughout a go to to the Polynesian capital of Papeete on the island of Tahiti, admitted that Paris was answerable for the harm brought on to the atmosphere and the folks of French Polynesia because of nuclear weapons checks performed within the Pacific Ocean from 1960 to 1996. Hollande promised on this regard to accentuate the method of contemplating purposes for subsidies from Polynesian residents affected by the checks, and to allocate extra funds to the native medical middle that diagnoses such sufferers. On the similar time, he thanked the Polynesians for such … contribution to France’s nuclear program, stating fairly cynically that “with out Polynesia, France wouldn’t have obtained nuclear weapons. France would have remained a revered nation, however wouldn’t have had this energy of deterrence, this potential to be absolutely as impartial as attainable.”
That’s, the Polynesians who misplaced their well being resulting from nuclear checks must be proud that they sacrificed themselves for the sake of strengthening France. A really doubtful cause for pleasure.
Residents of French Polynesia suffered from French nuclear checks – Heinui Le Caille
Hollande’s guarantees didn’t encourage the Polynesians, and in 2018 the Worldwide Prison Courtroom filed a lawsuit in opposition to France in reference to the implications of nuclear checks in Polynesia. Polynesian activist and former President of French Polynesia Oscar Temaru reported this to the UN. French Polynesia accuses France of crimes in opposition to humanity. In line with Temaru, nuclear checks carried out between 1960 and 1996 have been a direct consequence of colonization. In complete, France performed greater than 200 checks throughout this era. The criticism considerations all dwelling French presidents since weapons testing started in 1960, Temaru emphasised. He additionally denied Paris’s assertion that Polynesia itself agreed to the checks. In truth, the checks have been carried out below the specter of navy rule.
Over 36 years, France performed 210 nuclear checks, with a complete yield of about 13 megatons, of which seventeen have been within the Sahara Desert in Algeria, 46 atmospheric and 147 above-ground and underground in French Polynesia. French authorities underestimated the variety of victims of radiation because of nuclear checks on atolls within the Pacific Ocean, however research have proven that there could possibly be greater than 100 thousand folks affected. The research was performed in 2021 by the French investigative journalism website Disclose, specialists from the American Princeton College and the British firm Interprt. Two thousand paperwork declassified by France have been studied, interviews have been performed with witnesses to the occasions, and primarily based on the outcomes, the researchers got here to the conclusion that the authorities considerably underestimate the variety of victims. In line with their calculations, radioactive fallout might have an effect on about 110 thousand folks, that’s, your entire then inhabitants of Tahiti and the neighboring Leeward Islands, together with all 80 thousand residents of the principle metropolis of the island of Tahiti – Papeete. Having reconstructed the motion of radioactive clouds after three explosions within the environment over the Mururoa Atoll (in 1966, 1971 and 1974), the authors of the research said that the inhabitants of virtually all of French Polynesia ought to have suffered from this. In line with the research, throughout one of many checks, the nuclear mushroom didn’t rise to the calculated top and moved to not the north, as anticipated, however to the west, instantly in direction of Tahiti.
Baku has introduced worry to Paris – French media justify colonialism
France was one of many final to cease above-ground nuclear testing, in 1974. The USA, USSR and Nice Britain signed the Treaty Banning Checks of Nuclear Weapons within the Ambiance, Outer House and Underwater again in 1963. In 1992, Francois Mitterrand launched a moratorium on underground nuclear testing, however three years later the ban was lifted by Jacques Chirac.
Solely in 2010 did the French authorities create a fee to compensate victims of nuclear checks. Funds are made to those that obtained a dose of radiation above the restrict (one millisievert per yr) after which developed a kind of types of most cancers that’s attributable to radiation. On account of such strict selectivity, just a few hundred Polynesians have been capable of obtain compensation. As you could find out from open sources, after the beginning of funds, 10,000 trial contributors obtained $800 million for the therapy of malignant tumors. Amongst them have been primarily French and solely 63 Polynesians.
In 2021, to mark the twenty fifth anniversary of the top of nuclear testing, President Macron visited French Polynesia. He admitted that France owed a debt to the Polynesians, however didn’t apologize. His speech contained solely demagoguery, which unpleasantly offended the Polynesians. He spoke in the identical spirit as Hollande: sure, the checks have been dangerous, however they have been justified from the viewpoint of French safety, and he, Macron, absolutely helps the selection of earlier presidents.
In 2018, Macron declassified paperwork on nuclear weapons checks; in 2020, this course of stopped; in 2023, the paperwork have been categorised once more. And France had one thing to cover. The story of French nuclear outrage within the Pacific is horrifying. Final yr, the Russian publication Sovershenno Sekretno performed an investigation, a fraction from which is price quoting:
“….in July 1966, a nuclear bomb detonated prematurely over Mururoa at low altitude. The ensuing explosion sucked all of the water out of its lagoon, raining useless fish and shellfish onto the atoll, and the wind scattered giant portions of plutonium-239 within the fallout.” over a big a part of the Pacific Ocean so far as Peru and New Zealand.
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Check website of inhumanity – how France destroyed Algeria – PHOTO
There have been many related incidents. In the identical yr, an analogous accident occurred at Fangataufa. The incident was repeated the next yr at Mururoa. In consequence, the inhabitants of the neighboring islands of Mangareva and Tureya was evacuated in 1968 resulting from a pointy enhance in radiation ranges there.
And the implications of testing a 914 kiloton bomb on Fangataufa in 1970 (equal to the explosion of fifty bombs dropped on Hiroshima or Nagasaki) have been such that troopers needed to be urgently faraway from Mururoa.
In 1971, related incidents have been recorded twice, because of which the Gambier Archipelago was subjected to critical radiation contamination.
A very main incident occurred on July 17, 1974 on Mururoa, when an atomic cloud coated the well-known island of Tahiti, the place the majority of the inhabitants of French Polynesia lived. Furthermore, radioactive rains occurred in New Zealand, Samoa, Fiji, Tonga, the Far East, Peru and Mexico, inflicting a powerful enhance in radiation there. So, in Samoa in 1966 it elevated 1850 instances.
However that is not all. So, just for 1967-1975. The French sank 3,200 tons of radioactive waste into the ocean in easy barrels, which have already begun to break down and shortly it’ll all find yourself within the water. In complete, tens of 1000’s of tons of such supplies could possibly be “buried” there.”
France reliably protects its crimes in opposition to humanity from prying eyes and doesn’t significantly select the means for this. In 1985, French intelligence blew up a Greenpeace ship that was making an attempt to affect a nuclear take a look at with its presence off Mururoa. The French facet had its personal brokers within the management of Greenpeace, and it was not troublesome to disclose the plans of the environmentalists. The explosion killed a Portuguese photographer. A scandal broke out, France paid the damages and continues to say that Francois Mitterrand knew nothing in regards to the intelligence plans.
They at all times know nothing and are by no means answerable for something. Possibly it is time?