Ecodefense, which comprises environment activists from several countries, and Norway-based Bellona said Monday that they had been barred from conducting soil tests in the town of Lesnoi, home to the military plant Elektrokhimpribor, where an incident of uranium self-ignition occurred July 3.
Plant managers and the Federal Service for Nuclear Power said the fire was extinguished in two hours and one worker was hospitalized, but he returned to work after medical examination. Authorities also said the local population had nothing to be concerned about.
But independent experts said at least 200 kg of uranium-238 caught fire and it took two and a half hours to extinguish the blaze. Given the amount of the substance, they said, the fire could have led to major radioactive emissions.
Sergei Novikov, agency press secretary, said the agency made a proposal to Ecodefense head Vladimir Slivyak in mid-July, after receiving complaints from the two organizations, to organize a trip to Lesnoi to measure background radiation.
Novikov said he had warned environmentalists that soil tests were out of question because of the Lesnoi facility was off-limits.
"The agency is interested in cooperation with environmental organizations: somebody has to perform an alarm function, but we disapprove of an irresponsible alarmism," Novikov said.
Novikov added that environmentalists had not even bothered to measure radiation, which he said was a further proof that it was within the norm.
But Ecodefense's Web site says alpha-ray, rather than gamma-ray, radiation was to be measured as uranium-238 emits weak gamma rays, but its alpha particles, although they are less penetrating than other forms of radiation, pose increased health risks if inhaled or ingested. Uranium, they said, is also chemically toxic.
The organization also accused the nuclear agency and plant officials of barring its experts from talking to workers and claimed the worker remained in hospital.
