Victor Lukyanow Radiation scare affects embassies and local residents According to numerous Belarusian media reports, several foreign embassies based in Minsk are to leave the country because of reportedly high levels of radiation caused by summer peatery and forest fires. The Israeli embassy is said to be the first to evacuate staff and family members from the country. The American embassy refuses to comment on the situation.
Official media refute the reports of a radiation surge as groundless.
In the meantime, residents of the Belarusian capital Minsk are close to panic, some sealing windows and preferring to stay indoors. Meanwhile, Reuters reported that wild fires in Ukraine have stirred up radioactive elements remaining in the environment from the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster and raised radiation levels downwind in Belarus. The Chernobyl plant has reduced its power by 50 percent for repairs and maintenance. Reuters quoted plant and government officials as saying that Chernobyl is operating normally and there have been no incidents. May said the West misunderstood his earlier statements on the creation of a joint Belarusian-Russian military force on Belarus' western border.