5 December 2011 Last updated at 11:03 GMT

Greenpeace France nuclear action prompts security alert

Environmental activists have broken into a French nuclear power

station, to highlight the "vulnerability" of atomic sites in France.

Greenpeace campaigners entered the site at Nogent-sur-Seine, 60

miles (95km) south-east of Paris, before dawn.

The activists climbed on top of a reactor building and unfurled a

banner, said a Greenpeace spokesman.

The power company, Electricite de France (EDF), says the intruders

were detected straight away.

Seven out of nine activists who entered the site have been

arrested, said the firm.

Greenpeace says there is no such thing as

safe nuclear power

The activists "were immediately detected by the security system and were permanently followed on the

site, without a decision being made to make use of force," said an EDF statement.

Greenpeace also targeted two other nuclear sites in France at the same time.

Banners were unfurled at those sites, say police, but it is not clear whether the activists managed to gain

entry.

The campaign group says it did succeed in putting up a banner on the Nogent-sur-Seine plant which read

"Safe Nuclear Power Doesn't Exist".

"The aim is to show the vulnerability of French nuclear installations and how easy it is to get to the heart of

a nuclear reactor," said a Greenpeace nuclear specialist, Sophia Majnoni.

She said a recent security audit of French nuclear plants "did not learn the lessons of Fukushima," the

Japanese nuclear plant crippled by an earthquake and tsunami in March.

'Irresponsible' action

French Industry Minister Eric Besson expressed

surprise when told of reports about the Greenpeace

action.

"That would mean there has been a dysfunction and

that measures must be taken to ensure that it doesn't

happen again," he told French radio.

An advisor to President Nicolas Sarkozy, Henri Guaino, said the Greenpeace action was "irresponsible", but

acknowledged that it raised concerns.

"This does make one think about the security of access to nuclear power plants," French news agency AFP

reported him as saying.

"Conclusions must be drawn from this."

France generates about 75% of its electricity from nuclear power.

The future of the nuclear industry has sparked heated political exchanges in the run up to next year's

presidential elections.

The opposition socialists say they want to reduce the country's dependence on nuclear power, but the

French government has accused them of undermining the industry to win Green party support.

Greenpeace has repeatedly targeted the French nuclear industry over safety concerns.

source:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-16029572

27 November 2011 Last updated at 14:34 GMT

German police clear nuclear waste train protest

Many of the protesters had tethered themselves to the rail tracks

Police in Germany say they have cleared thousands of protesters who were trying to block a trainload of

nuclear waste.

Protesters had blocked the tracks near the site in northern Germany where the spent nuclear fuel is to be

stored.

The 150 tonnes of uranium, originally from German nuclear plants, is being moved in 11 containers from

Normandy, France, where it was reprocessed.

It is the last of 12 such shipments from France because of a German move away from nuclear power.

Reports said 1,300 people had been detained following the clearing of the protest.

Riot police

About 20,000 police have been deployed along the

German route of the train.

When the train started out from north-western

France on Wednesday, riot police were used to

remove protesters who tried to block tracks.

Twelve arrests were made in the violent clashes which

erupted.

Other protests have also slowed the train's progress but have been largely peaceful.

Anti-nuclear activists have said it was too dangerous to move the nuclear waste 1,200km (750 miles) from

the Areva reprocessing plant at La Hague to its final destination of Gorleben.

Areva has denied that transportation of the waste poses a risk to the environment.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said this year that all of her country's nuclear plants would be shut down

by 2022.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-15910548