The 213° week of the vigil
in front of WHO
In order to make known to the public the World Health Organisation’s subordination to the nuclear lobby, its repeated failure to offer protection to people against radioactive contamination, and to demand that WHO respect its constitution, we are working simultaneously on a number of fronts :
The vigil in front of WHO in Geneva (Switzerland)
Since 26th April 2007, between one and three people have maintained the vigil outside the WHO building between the hours of 8.00 in the morning and 6.00 at night, every working day of WHO employees.
These photos were taken on the first day of the vigil that took place at the main entrance of the WHO building. Security guards quickly arrived and then called the police. The police ordered the three people doing the vigil to leave the premises by 1.00pm, on the grounds that they were trespassing on private property belonging to WHO.
The vigil has been held since then about a hundred metres from the main entrance, at the Morillons roundabout, on land belonging to the city of Geneva. Every month we have to ask for authorization from the city of Geneva to occupy this bit of pavement.
The people who take part in the vigil are citizens of a number of European countries, determined to join the action initiated by the Collective IndependentWHO to put pressure on the World Health Organisation to regain its independence from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)
Find out more about the vigil outside WHO in Geneva
If you would like to volunteer for the vigil in Geneva, or find out more, write to Paul Roullaud (paul.roullaud@free.fr) or telephone him on +33 (0)240 87 60 47
Our vigil has been taken up in other places !!!!!
Vigils in places other than Geneva.
Revision of the agreement WHA 12-40
signed on 28th May 1959 between WHO and the IAEA, through the expedient of the World Health Assembly.
Agreement WHA 12-40, is a major source of disinformation on the health and environmental consequences of the accident at Chernobyl. WHO must regain its independence completely so that it can investigate the relationship between radiation and health. Here are just three examples that illustrate perfectly the way in which the Agreement compromises the independence of WHO :
1. The IAEA, is committed, in its statutes, to the promotion of the peaceful use of the atom. It is therefore a commercial lobby group.
2. The IAEA has put itself forward as the body responsible for the setting of safety standards within the nuclear industry as a whole. It is therefore both judge and jury.
3. The IAEA has no mandate, nor any expertise in matters of public health.
This conflict of interests has prevented the dissemination of serious and independent information on the health and environmental consequences of the accident at Chernobyl and of all other nuclear activities, whether civil or military, for half a century, and continues to do so.
WHO is the international health authority upon which the world’s people rely to establish guidelines and health standards in ALL areas of health. In reality, Agreement WHA 12-40 makes WHO subordinate to the IAEA and prevents WHO from providing essential information, from undertaking appropriate action and fulfilling its constitutional role in the area of health and radiation.
Procedures for the revision of this Agreement
In order to revise the Agreement, the WHO General Assembly, held in May each year, must put it to the vote. Before this can happen, the Executive Council needs to put revision of the Agreement on to the agenda, in the preceding January. This requires that a Member State propose that it be put on the agenda, and that another Member State seconds the proposal. Further along in the process, the support of well known NGOs can be very useful in convincing Member States and to second the revision and it is equally useful in the final vote. Getting an item onto the agenda of the WHO General Assembly is a long process that can take years. Worse still, powerful Member States make the final decisions on the agenda, in practice, via informal channels.
Progress to date
At the heart of the collective IndependentWHO is a group working specifically on the demand for revision. We have sent every Permanent Mission of the Member States in Geneva information and requests for meetings and we have received little response. We have had meetings with two Permanent Missions. We have identified those Member States who for different reasons are more likely to support our request to put revision on to the agenda: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Bolivia, Canada, Cuba, Ireland, Norway, Switzerland and Venezuela. We have sent information and requests for support to various NGOs, without as yet any response.
In 2002, Canada, Norway, and Switzerland brought up the question at WHO, folllowing a demand from Contratom (An Association in Geneva and a founder member of our collective). Our task today is to follow up this important initiative and to insist on a clarification of WHO’s response to this question.
We would encourage individuals, groups, associations, political movements and NGOs to support this revision by any means possible, for instance, by writing to your MP, to Ministers of Health, the Environment or to Dr Chan, the Director General of WHO.
Download our project for revision of the agreement
Action at WHO
The first of these actions was to deliver to Madame Chan, the Director General of WHO, a number of research documents and papers about the catastrophe at the Chernobyl nuclear power station and its consequences on peoples’ health, past, present and future. This letter was made public on 22nd April 2009 at a press conference in Paris. ( Read the open letter to Madame Chan, Director General of WHO ).
For a second time, and as many organisations before us have done (Download the minutes of the meeting between WHO/PSR -IPPNW Switzerland and WILPF of 18th July 2002 -in French- ) , the collective IndependentWHO asked for a meeting with WHO. This was arranged for 2nd July 2009, with Dr Maria Neira, representing Madame Chan, the Director General. The meeting allowed us to highlight a number of issues, that had been sent to WHO in advance. (List of issues tackled during the meeting between WHO and IndependentWHO)
To support our action against WHO, you can take part in our campaign “Write to Madame Chan Director General of WHO”. A pre-printed postcard is available to send to Madame Chan, reminding her of the agreement between WHO and the IAEA and demanding its revision. Campaign ”Write to Madame Chan Director General of WHO”.
The Appeal by Health professionals for the Independence of WHO
Health professionals receive information and recommendations from WHO to help them in the prevention of illness and in the care of ill patients.
Also, the collective IndependentWHO joined with health professionals to initiate and pass on this appeal.
The health professionals who were the first signatories to the Appeal now call on their colleagues to join them in this appeal for the independence of WHO, either on line (read the Appeal and sign), or by letter by downloading this document.
We can all contribute something by presenting this appeal to our own doctor, pharmacist, nurse,….
Extracts :“We, as health professionals, join with those who have denounced this unacceptable situation for more than ten years now. With them, we demand revision of the Agreement (WHA 12-40) in order to restore independence to WHO in accordance with its constitution. We are asking our Minister of Health to place on the agenda of the next World Health Assembly the revision of the agreement between the IAEA and WHO, so that WHO can once again take up its role and “act as the directing and coordinating authority on international health work”, ”promote and conduct research ...”, and “provide information, counsel and assistance in the field of health”, which includes the area of ionising radiation.
The initiators of this appeal are :
| Fran Baum | Prof. Dept of Public Health, Flinders Univ. Co-Dir. People’s Health Movement (Australia) |
| Susanna Beretta-Piccoli | Pharmacist, Federal Diploma, Federation of Swiss Pharmacist (Switzerland) |
| Rosalie Bertell | Ph.D, Epidemiologist, Past Pres. Int. Instit. Concern for Public Health, Regent Int. Physicians for Humanitarian Medecine Geneva, International Science Oversight Committee, Ass. of Organic Consumers (USA) |
| Elena.B. Bourlakova | MD. Prof. Semenov Inst. of Clinical Physics, Acad. of Sciences, Moscow. (Russian Fed.) |
| Christelle Braconnot | Nurse, French Diploma (France) |
| Marina Carobbio | MD. Member of Parliament (Switzerland) |
| Blanche Dubois | Nurse, French Diploma (France) |
| Lena-Marie Glaubitz | Medical Student (Germany) |
| Liliane Maury Pasquier | Midwife, Senator (Switzerland) |
| Maria Roth-Bernasconi | Nurse, Member of Parliament (Switzerland) |
| Youri.I. Bandajevsky | MD. Prof, ex-Rector, Faculty of Medicine, Gomel (Belarus) |
| Abraham Behar | MD, Pres. As.Française Médecins Prévention Guerre Nucléaire, Past Pres. IPPNW Europe (France) |
| Chris Busby | Epidemiologist, Scientific Secretary, European Committee on Radiation Risk, (United Kingdom) |
| Denis Fauconnier | MD. General Practitioner, Corsica (France) |
| Michel Fernex | MD, Prof. Emeritus, Faculty of Medicine, Basel, Pres. Enfants Tchernobyl Bélarus (France) |
| Pierre Flor-Henry | MD, Prof, Dir. Psychiatric Services for Adults, Hospital of Alberta (Canada) |
| Claudio Knüesli | MD, Oncologist, Pres. PSR/ IPPNW Switzerland (Switzerland) |
| Andreas Nidecker | MD., Prof. Radiology, Faculty of Medicine, Basel (Switzerland) |
| Claudio Schuftan | MD. Int. Public Health Consultant for WHO, UNICEF, EC. Co-Dir, PHM (Vietnam) |
| Hani Serag | MD, Public Health Researcher, International Coordinator, People’s Health Movement (Egypt) |
| Joël Spiroux | MD, Environmental Health Expert, Union Rég. médecins libéraux, Hte Normandie (France) |
Download the Appeal by Health Professionals
other Read the Appeal by Health Professionals and sign onlineManifesto for an independent WHO
This Manifesto is aimed at anyone with a social conscience. It calls for the World Health Organisation (WHO) to fulfil its constitutional mandate by revising the Agreement of the 28th May 1959 that has resulted in its subordination to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
You can join with us in reading the Manifesto in full and signing it on line.
Alternatively, you can download a copy of it.
The citizens’ petition
The collective “IndependentWHO” has made available a citizens’ petition addressed to WHO and its Director General Madame Chan, outlining the facts that prove that WHO has been totally absent in the face of the health consequences of nuclear radiation.
This petition demands from WHO the revision of the WHO/IAEA agreement, known as “WHA 12-40”. It is precisely this agreement (WHA 12-40) that prevents WHO from taking any action.
Extract : I demand the revision of the agreement between WHO and IAEA, so that WHO can regain its independence :
- that it cease to act as an accomplice in the disinformation about the nuclear industry in general;
- that it support the work of researchers from the ex-Soviet Union and elsewhere, who are trying to help the population in the contaminated areas to withstand the effects of the disaster at Chernobyl;
- that it take the initiative in research and in protective medicine for the controversial problem of internal radiation through low level exposure to Caesium 137 and other radionuclides, some of which remain active for a few decades and some for hundreds of years.
I believe that all this research should be made public because none of us are safe from a nuclear accident for which we have, as yet, made no serious preparation.
Since 26th April 2007, people have maintained the vigil outside the WHO headquarters, in Geneva, from 8.00 in the morning to 6.00 at night on every working day, to denounce the agreement between WHO and IAEA and to demand that WHO regains its independence. I wholeheartedly support this action and call on WHO to fulfil its mission.
In signing this petition you are contributing to the action. Please ask other people to sign it.
Download the citizens’ petition
other Read in full and sign onlineEvents about Chernobyl, an enduring catastrophe
Exhibition of photographs of Liquidators who have died
We have 260 photos of Liquidators who have already died. Many more have lost their lives. On26th April 2004, the Ukrainian ambassador to Belgium announced that 25,000 Liquidators had already died. We know that about 800,000 women and men were called up to fight the fire in the reactor at the nuclear power station and to reduce the effects of the disaster. It is estimated that today 10% of these are dead and 30% are ill.
In its last report on Chernobyl, in 2005, WHO estimated that the disaster had caused the death of about 50 people and 4000 cases of thyroid cancer in children.
Look at all the portraits of the Liquidators
If you would like to borrow the collective’s exhibition or you would like a copy of the CD so that you can mount your own exhibition, contact the webmaster Hear from other groups who have presented the exhibition.
Download the WHO-IAEA-UNDP Joint Report concerning the Liquidators
The Grand Hippocratic Vigil
On Saturday 26th April 2008, on the anniversary of the disaster at Chernobyl, 300 people maintained a silent vigil around the WHO complex for half an hour. They wore masks to symbolize the victims of radioactive contamination. Following the silent vigil, flowers were placed at the Place des Nations in Geneva. Similar actions took place at the same time all over the world.
On the 25th and 26th April 2009, the participants of the vigil came together in Geneva for the 23rd commemoration of the disaster.23rd commemoration of the disaster at Chernobyl in Geneva.
The commemorations of the disaster at Chernobyl in the world
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