Nigel Treblin / AP
Farmers queue with their tractors near Gusborn, northern Germany, Saturday Nov. 26, 2011. They are on their way to a demonstration in Dannenberg, to protest against the transport and storage of nuclear waste in Germany. Vertical banner reads : Fukushima is everywhere. The shipment of nuclear waste reprocessed in France crossed into Germany Friday on its way to a controversial storage site in Gorleben that protesters say is unsafe. It is the first such shipment from France to Germany since Berlin decided to shut all its nuclear plants by 2022, following the disaster at Japan's Fukushima plant. The transport is due to arrive at the storage site on Sunday. (AP Photo/dapd/ Nigel Treblin)

By JUERGEN BAETZ

updated 30 minutes ago


BERLIN — Police used water cannons to disperse about 300 protesters hurling rocks and fireworks during an attempt to disrupt a shipment of nuclear waste in northern Germany on Saturday, officials said.

Another 50 activists tried to sabotage the rail tracks that will be used by a train this weekend to transport the nuclear waste to the storage facility near the northern town of Gorleben, police spokesman Stefan Kuehm-Stoltz said.

On Friday, police clashed with some 200 protesters near the northern town of Dannenberg. Some 20 officers were injured during the clash, police said.

Police said several thousand protesters were gathering in Dannenberg Saturday to hold a peaceful protest rally. Organizers said some 23,000 people already joined the protest.

The train carrying the shipment of 11 containers of nuclear waste reprocessed at France's La Hague facility entered western Germany on Friday after delays in France, where activists damaged railway tracks in an attempt to halt the cargo.

On the German side, protesters repeatedly staged sit-ins on the railway tracks, slowing down the shipment until police carried them away. The shipment is expected to reach its destination sometime over the weekend.

Some 20,000 German police officers are on hand to secure the shipment.

Nuclear energy has been unpopular in Germany since fallout from the 1986 Chernobyl disaster in Ukraine drifted over the country. The annual shipment from France has been a traditional focal point for protesters.

This is the first shipment, however, since Chancellor Angela Merkel decided to speed up shutting down all of Germany's nuclear plants, with the last one scheduled to go offline by 2022, following safety questions raised after the disaster at Fukushima plant in Japan.

Activists in Germany say that the waste containers, and the temporary storage facility near Gorleben, are not safe.

Germany has not yet decided where such waste, which remains radioactive for thousands of years, should be stored permanently.


Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45443901/ns/us_news-environment/#.TtD3x2PyGqE