The United Nations announced  April 26th a World Day to commemorate the Chernobyl disaster, the worst nuclear accident ever known to mankind. The United Nations recognized that, despite the fact that more than three decades had passed, there are still serious long-term consequences caused  by the disaster and called upon the whole world to commemorate the day.

The Chernobyl accident took place on 26 th of  April 1986, when one of the nuclear reactors at the Chernobyl plant in Ukraine in the former Soviet Union exploded . The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that the radiation from the accident is 100 times that of Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined, and that more than 8 million people in Belarus, Russia and Ukraine have been exposed to radiation. The radiation from the  accident had also spread to 40 percent of Europe and eventually to much of the world.

Chernobyl has become a milestone in the world's position towards nuclear energy.

Although it had led to  improving nuclear safety standards and  emergency strategies , it had also led many countries to review the idea itself of  using nuclear energy for electricity.

Indeed, the use of nuclear energy in the world is steadily diminishing after Chernobyl.

On the International Day of Commemoration of  Chernobyl, the EIPR publishes a position paper on nuclear energy entitled "The nuclear energy more expensive and more dangerous”.

The paper calls for solidarity with the victims of the disaster and for drawing lessons and reviewing ideas on the use of nuclear energy, especially with cheaper and safer alternatives.