The environmental group Greenpeace on Wednesday said a recent UN report playing down the effects of the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster was aimed at helping Russia's nuclear lobby make its case for building new reactors.
"This report is part of public relations operation to make the problem appear less bad in public opinion, while 70 to 80 percent of Russians oppose the building of nuclear power stations near them," Vladimir Chuprov from Greenpeace Russia said at a news conference in Moscow.
The UN report, published in September 2005 ahead of the 20th anniversary of Chernobyl on April 26 of this year said the consequences of the catastrophe had been "exaggerated."
The report put the toll from the disaster in the three former Soviet republics of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus at 4,000 people.
Citing research by the Russian Academy of Sciences, Greenpeace said 67,000 people died in Russia between 1990 and 2004 from the effects of Chernobyl.
Chuprov said the UN report "aims to support ideologically the construction of 40 nuclear power stations in Russia by 2030."
The report also put at risk subsidies from the Russian government received by firemen, soldiers and workers sent to Chernobyl to clean up the area after the disaster, Chuprov said.
It also undermined programmes to help areas contaminated by the nuclear fallout, he added.
Lyudmila Komogortseva, a local assembly member in the southwest Russian province of Bryansk that was most affected by Chernobyl, said several programmes for supplying local schools with uncontaminated food and water had not received financing in years.
