 Mnm. Mireille Musso, Ambassador of France in Belarus (from February 2007)
Amb. Stephane Chmelewsky, Ambassador of France in Belarus (up to December 2006)  More than 18 years after the Chernobyl catastrophe, one fifth of the Belarusian citizens are still exposed in their everyday life to radiological contamination, unnoticeable by human senses. The inhabitants of contaminated territories are very often helpless against this invisible, long-lasting threat, which affects not only health but also every area of life. The last defences that can be opposed would then be silence and oblivion?
Taking into account the complexity of a radiological contamination that has overrun the soil, the food chain and even the very body of individuals, the ETHOS 1 and ETHOS 2 projects (1996-2001) had been implemented by a French multidisciplinary team, in close coordination with the national and local authorities and local professionals of the involved villages. The aim was to build together with the population a practical comprehension of the problems created by contamination in every day life. The success of this experiment has shown that it was possible for the inhabitants of contaminated villages to define strategies, efficient and well adapted to local context, for reducing the exposition to radiations. The French Ministry of Foreign Affairs acknowledged the need to carry on working in this way, together with the stakeholders involved into the ETHOS projects, in particular the Chernobyl Committee. The French Embassy in the Republic of Belarus therefore joined the CORE programme since its preparatory phase and signed the Declaration of Principles on the 2nd December 2003. Complementarily, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs is financially supporting the work of French organizations within the CORE programme – CEPN, FERT, PSF and ACRO – in the framework of two projects: “Practical radiological culture, intergenerational and international memory – CORE Edu” and “Rehabilitation and development of rural economy in contaminated territories – CORE Agri”. The CORE programme allows all the willing stakeholders – simple inhabitants of the villages, associations, national and local authorities, international organizations … – to work together and build a common strategy for the rehabilitation of living conditions in the contaminated areas. I wish this gathering of energies alongside with the people who live with radiation would be stronger day after day in order to answer together with them the mainly human question of life on a contaminated land.
Stephane Chmelewsky,
Ambassador of France in the Republic of Belarus
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