Turkish and Greek greens join forces in anti-nuke demo

CYPRIOT, Greek and Turkish environmentalists will join forces in Athens on Saturday to protest against Turkey’s plans to build a nuclear power station at Akkuyu.

The demonstration will be staged outside the Canadian embassy in the Greek capital, in an attempt to dissuade Canadian firms from supplying technology for the power plant.

The proposed site for the plant is on Turkey’s southern coast, less than 60 miles from Cyprus.

“This is the first time Greek, Turkish and Cypriot greens will have met for a common protest against the Turkish nuclear power station at Akkuyu,” the Green party said yesterday.

Local protesters will set off on Friday, carrying with them a 60-foot banner proclaiming: “No Nuclear Power,” in Greek, Turkish and English. The travelling demonstrators will also take with them thousands of protest letters calling on Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chrétien not to allow the export of nuclear technology to Turkey.

Akkuyu lies in an active earthquake zone, and a Greek government study suggests that Cyprus would be swamped in nuclear fallout in the event of an accident at the proposed plant.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.