[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 166 (Wednesday, October 25, 1995)]
[House]
[Pages H10843-H10846]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
FRENCH NUCLEAR TESTINGS A DANGER TO MORUROA ATOLL
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Weldon of Florida). Under the Speaker's
announced policy of May 12, 1995, the gentleman from American Samoa
[[Page H10844]]
[Mr. Faleomavaega] is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the
minority leader.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Mr. Speaker, I rise again to share with my
colleagues and the American people a very serious problem with France's
resumption of nuclear testing in the South Pacific, which started last
month despite near universal condemnation by the Nations of the world.
Mr. Speaker, the first Sunday of this month France detonated a 110-
kiloton nuclear device more destructive than seven Hiroshima bombs that
were dropped in Japan about 50 years ago. It was the second in a series
of nuclear explosions to take place in France's test facilities in
French Polynesia.
Mr. Speaker, over three decades, France has detonated in excess of
200 nuclear bombs, almost all of them taking place in the South
Pacific. Yet this is still not enough to satisfy France's ambitions to
become a nuclear power.
French President Chirac boldly claims that their nuclear tests have
no ecological consequences and that they have nothing to fear nor to
hide. President Chirac has even invited scientists from the
international community to come to their testing facilities to see for
themselves.
When the countries of Europe recently took Chirac up on his offer for
an ``open door'' inspection, however, it is interesting to note the
results of this so-called open door policy.
The European Union team of scientists sent to examine Moruroa Atoll
has now returned to Brussels, stating that they were denied full access
to test sites and radioactivity monitoring facilities. Moreover, the
French authorities failed to supply necessary health and safety data
requested by the European Union scientists.
Not surprisingly, the European Union team has not been able to issue
conclusive findings regarding France's testing program, as they were
prevented by the French government from conducting a true study.
{time} 2145
While the French Government claims they have nothing to hide and
welcome international scrutiny of their nuclear testing program, Mr.
Speaker, President Chirac's actions reveal nothing more than sheer
hypocrisy not only to the good citizens of France, but to the world as
well.
Mr. Speaker, I would also note that Reuters News Agency last week
reported from Brussels that a French scientist states that France's
South Pacific weapons test site is unstable. There is a risk of
landslides and tidal waves which could submerge islands in French
Polynesia. Dr. Pierre Vincent, a volcanologist and professor at the
University of Clermont-Ferrand, testified at a European Parliament
hearing on France's South Pacific nuclear testing, and he said this is
an unstable atoll. He was referring to the Mururoa atoll, Mr. Speaker.
I would say this situation constitutes a high risk.
All the factors which we know now favor destabilization in volcanoes
are gathered together at Mururoa, Dr. Vincent testified, pointing to
the atoll's steep sides, fissuring in the atoll and alterations of
substructure by previous tests.
Dr. Vincent further states the shock wave from a new explosion could
be the trigger that would cause detachment of previously disturbed
sections of rock. He said such landslides could cause tsunamis, which
means tidal waves, seismic waves from undersea earthquakes or
landslides which could submerge the whole of certain islands of
Polynesia.
Mr. Speaker, Professor Vincent concluded it was high time to stop the
nuclear testing program France is conducting now in the Pacific, but
even an immediate halt to France's current series of tests in the
region would not remove the risk. He said if we stop tomorrow, if that
could happen, we could certainly have to continue to monitor this atoll
for decades and probably a lot longer than that.
Mr. Speaker, France's resumed nuclear tests on Mururoa and Fangataufa
atolls, which are actually dormant volcanic formations below sea level,
has also initiated an investigation by the European Parliament and the
New Zealand Government into possible connections with the recent
eruptions of New Zealand's Mt. Ruapehu, a volcano dormant for the past
50 years.
Internationally Mr. Speaker, the movement against France's nuclear
testing in the South Pacific is growing stronger and stronger. Over 100
nations adopted in Vienna an international Atomic Energy Agency
resolution condemning nuclear testing. The United Nations General
Assembly in New York is soon to pass a resolution opposing all nuclear
testing, while in London the British Commonwealth is pressuring France
about its insensitivity in conducting nuclear tests in the South
Pacific.
Mr. Speaker, I would hope all of our colleagues in the Congress would
join us in sending an urgent message to Paris to stop their nuclear
nightmare in the Pacific. Mr. Speaker, I want to share with my
colleagues, this is what a French nuclear bomb explosion looks like on
this atoll, the Mururoa atoll in French Polynesia. I have also made an
illustration of exactly what the concerns have been for the nations of
the Pacific for all of these years and for many scientists.
As you can see, Mr. Speaker, this is the Mururoa atoll from the
vertical as seen from an airplane. This is what the atoll looks like,
and by the way, this illustration was gotten from documents of the
French Government showing areas that were completely contaminated in
the aftermath of the French nuclear program and the testing for the
past 20 years.
This is the profile of what the Mururoa atoll, which is this green
strip, which is right on sea level; Mururoa atoll is only about 3 feet
above sea level, and below this whole atoll is this volcanic formation.
As you can see, Mr. Speaker, these dots, these red dots are 165 atomic
explosions that have taken place on that atoll for the last 20 years.
In addition to this, France has also exploded 12 nuclear bombs above
sea level, which is basically in the atmosphere. I submit, Mr. Speaker,
who is going to clean up this mess if this atoll ever, ever should
leak, come out of this, because of what has happened inside this atoll?
Now some people might say, well, let us not be concerned about it,
because it is thousands of miles away from the State of Hawaii as well
as along the Pacific Coast States. Mr. Speaker, I submit if this atoll
every breaks or starts to leak and all the nuclear contamination that
is contained here after France conducting 165 nuclear explosions inside
this volcanic formation that supports this atoll, I submit, Mr.
Speaker, who is going to clean up this mess?
I submit also that France does not have the capability to clean up
this mess if it ever does come to this within the next 10, perhaps even
50 years that this will transpire.
Mr. Speaker, this is a sad occasion, given the fact that over 60
percent of the French people themselves do not want France or President
Chirac to conduct this nuclear testing nightmare, as we see it, in the
Pacific. And yet the French Government persists that they do this in
the name of its national interest.
Mr. Speaker, I am very concerned in the fact that President Chirac
does not take into account the fact that 28 million men, women, and
children, live in this Pacific region, let alone there are some 200,000
French citizens who are of Tahitian ancestry that live also in these
islands, and yet we hear nothing but absolute stubbornness, and I would
also submit, Mr. Speaker, perhaps you could even say arrogance on the
part of the French Government, not the goodness of the French people,
but the French Government to continue doing this despite the
condemnation of over 160 countries throughout the world.
Why are we doing this?
Is it not ironic, Mr. Speaker, that while we condemn germ warfare,
while we outlaw chemical and biological warfare, we continue to allow
not only industrial countries but the fact that we have got nuclear
bombs all over the place that cause just as much, if not more, harm and
damage not only to the environment but to human beings, and yet we
continue to allow this.
I stated earlier that the nuclear bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima
50 years ago, Mr. Speaker, killed, maimed approximately 200,000 men,
women, and children. In addition to that, 90,000 men, women, and
children were also killed with the bomb that we dropped on Nagasaki. In
the aftermath of this, and I would make a personal
[[Page H10845]]
appeal to the American people, we have got to send a strong message to
President Chirac and the only way to do this, perhaps not necessarily
through governmental channels, but the conscience of the American
people and the conscience of the people in Japan and even in Germany to
voluntarily not purchase French products, French wine, French goods, to
send a strong message to the French Government that this policy of
continuing to explode nuclear bombs in the South Pacific, not only is
it insane but it is an outright shame for the Government of France to
continue to do this in the aftermath, at least at the expense of the
health and safety and the lives of those people who live in that part
of the world.
The information referred to follows:
[From the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, Oct. 11, 1995]
French Paper Runs a Photo of Mururoa Coral Cracks
Paris.--Raising new questions about the safety of French
nuclear tests, a newspaper published photographs today that
it says show cracks in one of the South Pacific atolls where
the underground explosions took place.
Ouest-France said the photographs contradict government
claims that the tests caused no damage to Mururoa Atoll in
French Polynesia.
Critics say the nuclear tests could cause the atoll to
break apart, spewing radioactivity into the water and air in
what many consider to be one of the world's last paradises.
The government denied a similar report last week in the
respected daily Le Monde. It had no immediate comment on
Ouest-France's claims.
Ouest-France said the photos were taken in 1987 and 1988 by
a diver several dozen yards under the Mururoa Lagoon.
The cracks are about 9 to 10\1/2\ feet wide and several
miles long, the newspaper said.
Normally only military personnel and scientists working on
the French nuclear program have access to the isolated atoll,
about 750 miles southeast of Tahiti.
After the Le Monde report, French Foreign Minister Herve de
Charette told the National Assembly that ``no crack of any
sort has ever been discovered'' on the atoll.
Experts at the French Atomic Energy Commission said some
fractures were created by the first tests carried out
directly under Mururoa's reef.
But they said there had been no further cracks since tests
were moved to the middle of the lagoon.
European Commission President Jacques Santer demanded
Wednesday that France supply more information about the
nuclear tests ``without delay.''
____
[From the Honolulu Advertiser, Oct. 5, 1995]
French Deny Report That N-Test Site Full of Cracks
Paris.--A report that a South Pacific island used for
France's nuclear tests is full of cracks put the government
back on the defensive yesterday over its underground testing
program.
The Defense Ministry dismissed the report as ``trivial and
whimsical,'' and said it has the situation at Mururoa Atoll
under ``perfect scientific and ecological control.''
The Paris newspaper Le Monde reported Tuesday that a 1980
French army map shows that years of nuclear pounding had
cracked the atoll, site of a 20-kiloton nuclear test blast on
Sept. 5.
Some scientists have warned that the atoll could break open
under the force of continued test blasts or a natural
disaster, releasing radioactivity and poisoning an area known
for its coral reefs and crystal waters.
Gen. Raymond Germanos denied the newspaper report and
accused the environmental group Greenpeace of twisting
decade-old unofficial data about the atoll. He said the
newspaper's map misplaced key features of the island and the
test facility.
____
[From the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, Oct. 9, 1995]
Suspicion Clouds French Nuclear Tests
(By Gary T. Kubota)
Papeete, Tahiti.--Three of his babies were stillborn.
An infant son lived for a year before dying of leukemia.
His 1-year-old daughter died from a painful disease that
blackened her skin.
Edwin Haoa, 57, believes his five children died from
illnesses related to a change in his body that produced
defective sperm, a result of radioactive contamination while
he worked at nuclear testing sites in French Polynesia.
Haoa said he can't prove he was contaminated, nor confirm
his suspicions about his children's causes of death, because
the French have refused to release his medical records for
his period of work from 1963 through 1977.
While the French government claims the radioactive fallout
was too little to harm workers or islanders, some experts say
the lack of medical information tells them France has no
proof the nuclear testing is safe.
Critics say the failure to provide answers to workers such
as Haoa undermines the government's credibility in French
Polynesia, where more than 80 percent of the 212,000
residents are Polynesian or part-Polynesian. It has also
contributed to growing worldwide opposition to the current
underground testing, which began with a first test Sept. 5 at
Mururoa atoll, 750 miles southeast of Tahiti. A second test
was done beneath Fangataufa atoll Oct. 1. The French plan up
to eight tests through next spring.
More than 10,000 civilians and military personnel worked at
Mururoa and Fangataufa atolls, the site of 41 nuclear
atmospheric tests between 1966 and 1974. But bound by a code
of silence they signed while applying for jobs, most have
avoided publicity.
Haoa and 53 other former workers who witnessed the nuclear
tests stepped forward recently, when France announced its
resumption of nuclear tests in French Polynesia.
``Some of them have seen their friends die of unknown
causes,'' said Oscar Temaru, mayor of the poor working-class
district Faaa.
cancer rates higher
A report by the group ``Centre de Documentation & Recheche
sur la Paix et les Conflits,'' which translates center of
documentation and research on peace and conflict, indicates
leukemia and thyroid cancer rates were significantly higher
in French Polynesia than other Pacific island nations.
The group's facts come from compiling cancer incidence
rates from the South Pacific Commission. Among French
Polynesian women the incidence of thyroid cancer was 17.6
cases per 100,000 population in 1989-90, compared with 8.6
for Fijian women in 1990 and 10.5 for Hawaii women from 1978-
1982.
Maire Masson, 38, a Tahitian woman who had a thyroid
operation at 19, wants to know if her illness and similar
health problems in her family are hereditary or a result of
nuclear fallout.
``When I ask one doctor, he says, `It's hereditary.' When I
ask another, he says, `No, it's not hereditary,''' Masson
said.
Haoa said the doctors at the French government hospital did
not list the cause of deaths for his five children--and when
he told them he thought it was due to his work at the nuclear
sites, they told him he was crazy.
But he recalled one physician taking him aside and saying
that if he wanted the real answers, he would have to get them
at medical facilities in a different country.
record-keeping criticized
While France has spent millions of dollars on nuclear
tests, its gathering of health statistics in French Polynesia
during the early years of nuclear testing has been sorely
lacking, critics say.
The official cancer registry of French Polynesia has
existed only since 1985. As late as 1988, only 60 percent of
cancers were being recorded in French Polynesia, critics say.
Death certificates became compulsory after 1981 but the
cause of death is not always listed.
``The statistics are very badly gathered and very badly
used,'' said Marie-Therese Danielsson, author of the book
``Poisoned Reign,'' published in 1986.
Until 1985, the main hospital in French Polynesia was
controlled by the military. Patients who had major medical
problems were flown to France.
The physicians group Medecins Sans Frontieres, has charged
that the French government failed to fulfill its ethical
responsibility toward those potentially at risk from
atmospheric testing.
The group, in its review of information this year, said no
reliable health statistics were available to see if people
were adversely affected as a result of 41 atmospheric tests.
``If such data do exist, they are not available in the
public domain,'' the group said.
The group in July recommended French Polynesia improve its
registry of cancer patients, publish all available facts
on the health of French nuclear workers, and track the
health of the general population.
It also called for improving health care access for
residents of Gambier and Tureia, islands close to Mururoa.
Roger Ducousso, director of radiological protection for the
French defense department, said he doesn't think medical
tests for the people in French Polynesia are necessary.
Ducousso said the radioactive fallout was so low in dosage
that there is no possibility of chromosome damage.
Ducousso said the high rate of thyroid cancer among
Polynesians in French Polynesia is an ethnic characteristic
and is common among Polynesians in Hawaii, New Caledonia and
New Zealand. He said during the years of testing at Mururoa
and Fangataufa, no one died or got sick from radioactivity.
case may be hard to prove
Haoa disagrees but doesn't know if he'll ever be able to
prove it. He knows information about his health was recorded
while he was working at the nuclear test sites. He said he
took a physical every three weeks, including a blood test.
Haoa, who claims he witnessed more than 30 atmospheric
tests, recalled viewing one from about 45 miles away that
produced a mushroom cloud rising more than 1,300 feet.
He and other workers would return to the test sites a few
hours to a few days later, depending on the wind direction.
He wore a special suit to shovel sand over contaminated
areas. Later, he and other workers built walls and bunkers
over the sandy areas.
At Fangataufa, employees who arrived by air went into an
enclosure and entered a bus
[[Page H10846]]
to travel to parts of the atoll. Signs outside warned workers not to
walk across the lagoon. One day, a friend did. That night,
his friend died, Haoa recalled.
____
[From the Honolulu Star-Bulletin, Oct. 9, 1995]
France Claims No Radiation Increase From Test
Paris.--France said today that its recent test of a nuclear
warhead with the explosive force of just below 110,000 tons
of TNT had not raised radiation levels at its Fangataufa
atoll testing site in the South Pacific.
Measurements taken at the site in French Polynesia found
the same low ``background'' level of radioactivity after the
Oct. 1 test as before the blast, European Affairs Minister
Michel Barnier wrote to EU Environment Commissioner Ritt
Bjerregaard.
The level of radioactivity on the atoll corresponds to weak
natural background levels, Barnier said in his letter to
Bjerregaard, which was sent on Friday.
A copy of the letter has been released by the French
Foreign Ministry.
Bjerregarrd has complained that France prevented European
Commission experts from visiting Fangataufa and refused to
turn over data on radioactivity in the water and marine life
around the Mururoa atoll, where the first French nuclear test
in the current series took place on Sept. 5.
Barnier, in his letter, dismissed her complaints, saying
the commission experts were allowed to visit more sites than
had initially been planned and were given all the data they
sought.
____
[From the Congressional Research Service, the Library of Congress,
Washington, DC]
Source: Le Monde, August 2, 1995, n.p.
Paris Publishes First List of Its Nuclear Tests
Francois Mitterrand was the first French President to
authorize a greater number. More than two hundred shots since
1960, three caused initial contamination.
France has just published for the first time a complete and
detailed list of her nuclear tests since 1960, the date of
the first test in the Sahara. This list, which contains the
code name for each operation, the hour of the explosion,
place and explosive power released has been published in a
general survey (three volumes and a fourth in preparation) of
nearly 670 pages published jointly by the Administration of
Military Applications (DAM) for the Atomic Energy Commission
(AEC) and the management of the Centers for Nuclear
Experimentation (DIRCEN). It appears that in toto France has
had 240 launches, of which 12 are classified. It was Francois
Mitterrand who was the one of all the heads of state during
the Fifth Republic to order the--by far--the greatest number
of tests.
In the Sahara between February 1960 and February 1966,
France initiated 17 launches in all (four atmospheric tests
and 13 underground tests at the bottom of a mine in a
mountain. In Polynesia, between July 1966 and July 1991,
France undertook 175 tests (41 in the atmosphere and 78
underground ones in shafts dug in the crown of coral atolls
and 56 underground ones in shafts sunk into the lagoon.) The
Mururoa Atoll was used for the greatest number of shots
(163). There were also 12 tests carried out on Fangataufa,
about 40 kilometers away.
twelve ``security'' shots
Of all the tests three were of the same kind: It concerned
dropping a life-size weapon from a plane (a Mirage IV, a
Mirage III-E, and a Jaguar) in July 1966, in August of 1973,
and in July, 1974 several dozen kilometers away from Mururoa
Atoll. These gravitational weapons were the NA-22 (60
kilotons) and the AN-52 (20 kilotons) then in use in the
French Air Force. There were replaced by the ASMO missile,
weighing 300 kilotons.
To the above total must be added 12 security experiments on
Mururoa between July 1966 and November 1989. The security
shots were intended to verify whether the weapon was safe,
i.e., that it would not explode inopportunely when
subjected to external pressures of shock, uncontrolled
vibrations, or fire. Security bolts are thought to be able
to stop the launching of the weapon. These bolts also have
a more political purpose, as the head of the government is
the one who in the last resort would be the one to start
the nuclear conflagration--if need be--by raising the
bolts by remote control.
Most of the tests, including the Sahara ones, were
moderate- or low-energy ones. So, just to stay with
Polynesia, 63 tests (18 atmospheric tests and 45 underground
ones) developed a force of between 5 to 20 kilotons (the
energy emitted at Hiroshima was about 18 kilotons). Likewise
56 tests (11 atmospheric and 45 underground) were between 20
and 200 kilotons. Finally 54 tests (10 atmospheric and 44
underground) emitted energy between 150 and 1000 kilotons.
Only three atmospheric shots (the first in May of 1968 on
Fangautafa, and the second in August of the same year on
Mururoa) developed very high energy, higher than a megaton.
The tests, according to AEC engineers caused initial
contamination. The first, named ``Ganymede'' was an
atmospheric shot under a balloon on Mururoa in July 1966. The
second, called ``Rigel'' was an atmospheric (the bomb was put
on a barge) in September 1966 on Fangataufa. The third one,
called ``Parthenope'' was an atmospheric shot under a ballon
[sous ballon] in August 1973 on Mururoa. The areas had to be
decontaminated, i.e., surface sediments freed from
radioactivity.
The comparisons undertaken afterwards by French technicians
with the news being broadcast at the time by the New
Zealanders--at the time France issued no statements
concerning the testing--show that the method of detection
using seismic sensors at a distance from the explosion is not
reliable.
three times more than de gaulle
If the error in assessing energy is greater than 100
percent in 20 percent of cases, which means that the
detection by New Zealand stations of the shock caused by the
underground test overestimated by a factor of two the actual
power of the bomb tested in Polynesia. This method of
oversight is, at present, the only one available, if you
exclude direct espionage on test sites themselves or in the
laboratories which subsequently use the results obtained. Its
non-reliability could prove to be disturbing in the long run
during discussions on the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty in Geneva,
in dealing with countries likely to carry out clandestine
low-energy tests in areas difficult to reach or prohibited
from any one site control.
A final observation may be made from this information,
published for the first time from an official French source.
Between February of 1960 and August of 1968 (there were no
tests in 1969), General De Gaulle authorized 30 shots: the 17
recorded in the Sahara and 13 more in Polynesia. Between July
1981 and July 1991 (the moratorium was declared in April
1992), Francois Mitterrand ordered 86 tests. During a period
of time comparable enough for the two men, give or take a few
months--Mitterrand undertook roughly three times the number
of tests than did the founder of the Fifth Republic and
theoretician of dissuasion.
However, despite this pronuclear zeal, history will no
doubt remember that in 1992, Mitterrand decreed without prior
consultation with the administration, chiefs of staff or AEC
officials a unilateral suspension of French tests, which
General de Gaulle defied the international community by
deciding in 1960 to launch the first French tests in the
Sahara, while the United States (and hence Great Britain,
which tested on American territory) and the ex-Soviet Union
were observing a joint moratorium.
____________________