After a trip of nearly five and a half days from Normandy in France the 13th delivery of processed German nuclear waste reached the “temporary” storage hall in Gorleben, a village in northwest Germany at about 10 pm on Monday.
Police perpetrated massive violence and breaches of the law against demonstrators, injuring at least 416 with truncheons, gas, dogs, horses and water cannons.
The 25,000 activists were the second largest number ever in the area, which the government has also designated as the final waste repository in a geologically unsafe salt deposit.
Resistance against the rail consignment began in France where activists reported police violence against them but also an upsurge of anti-nuclear sentiment in the country.
In the Gorleben area the resistance took the form of rail and road squats, chain-ons (one by three male and one female farmers causing a 14-hour delay in the train journey) and massive road traffic disruptions, notably by farmers with tractors and agricultural machinery.
It was the longest and most expensive waste delivery from La Hague to Gorleben and also the most expensive. The state government of Lower Saxony, where Gorleben is located, estimates its costs this year at 33 million euros. That doesn't include the cost of federal police guarding the train from the French border to the dump, which comes out of the national kitty.
For a blow-by-blow (no pun intended!) diary click here.