Home/Health/Multimedia

14/01/14

Working near uranium

By:Himadou Amadou

Republish

We encourage you to republish this article online and in print, it’s free under our creative commons attribution license, but please follow some simple guidelines:
  1. You have to credit our authors.
  2. You have to credit SciDev.Net — where possible include our logo with a link back to the original article.
  3. You can simply run the first few lines of the article and then add: “Read the full article on SciDev.Net” containing a link back to the original article.
  4. If you want to also take images published in this story you will need to confirm with the original source if you're licensed to use them.
  5. The easiest way to get the article on your site is to embed the code below.
更多信息查看我们的media page and republishing guidelines.

The full article is available here as HTML.

Press Ctrl-C to copy

Send to a friend

The details you provide on this page will not be used to send unsolicited email, and will not be sold to a 3rd party. See privacy policy.

At least one fifth of France’s light bulbs arepowered by Nigerien uranium. The French state-owned industrial firm Areva extracts the radioactive element from two mines outside the town of Arlit in Niger.

The company has been renegotiating its licence to extract uranium in the country. After two years of unfruitful negotiations with the Nigerien government, the previous licence expired in December. The government is seeking to increase the royalties it charges on uranium revenues. Areva claims this will make its mining operations unprofitable. Last month, it temporarily ceased all production for what it says is routine maintenance, but what its opponents see as a ploy to put pressure on the government.

This, the second film on mining in Arlit, focuses on ex-employees of Areva and their families. Greenpeace and local activists claim thatradioactive contaminationfrom the company’s operations has led toillnessesamong the employees andlocal population. Areva strongly denies this allegation.

Related links