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Kazakhstan: Lingering effects of nuclear tests

60 Years After First Soviet Nuclear Test, Legacy Of Misery Lives On In Kazakhstan
Radio Free Europe, August 28, 2009

By Bruce Pannier

“First Lightning,” a 22-kiloton nuclear bomb, exploded at 7 a.m. local time on August 29, 1949, at the Semipalatinsk testing site in northern Kazakhstan.  Thousands of cases of birth defects, cancer, and neurological illnesses have since been reported in the Semipalatinsk region. Livestock living within range of the site also suffer from deformities and other defects.

The Cold War nuclear arms race between the Soviet Union and the United States had begun. The United States, which had already demonstrated its nuclear capability with the deadly twin bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, dubbed the Soviet test bomb “Joe 1,” after Josef Stalin……………..

 

Merhat Sharipzhan. the former director of RFE/RL’s Kazakh Service, grew up in the shadow of the nuclear testing grounds. In this audio clip, he shares some of his memories:

60 Years After First Soviet Nuclear Test, Legacy Of Misery Lives On In Kazakhstan – Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty © 2009

August 29, 2009 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | 1, Kazakhstan, wastes | antinuclear, nuclear, nuclear wastes, nuclear weapons, radiation, radioactive