DANNENBERG, Germany — Guarded by riot police, a train bringing 1,320 tons of nuclear waste to a German dump site neared its destination Wednesday, despite delays caused by protesters who chained themselves to the rails, the Associated Press reports.
The convoy of 12 waste containers, the largest shipment yet to the Gorleben site, repeatedly ground to a halt on its 24-hour trip north through Germany after leaving from a French processing plant Monday.
A dozen protesters forced a 1 1/2-hour delay south of Bremen on Wednesday by occupying the tracks as others set fire to tires nearby. Earlier along its 375-mile German leg, the train had to stop twice for police to free activists who had chained themselves to the tracks.
Anti-nuclear activists put up determined resistance along the final stretch, defying a ban on demonstrations within 50 yards on either side of the route.
Police said they detained about 250 protesters Wednesday, 150 of them alone in Hitzacker, near Dannenberg, where protesters clashed with police bearing riot shields, who stood shoulder to shoulder along the rail line.
Several dozen police vehicles were damaged in the clashes to the point where they needed to be towed away, police said.
By dusk Wednesday, the train trundled into the rail terminal at Dannenberg, which was sealed off with barbed wire to protect the containers that were to be loaded onto trucks for the final stretch to the Gorleben dump.
The demonstrations brought together young protesters, local farmers and seasoned anti-nuclear activists, who argue that neither the waste containers nor the dump, a disused salt mine, are safe.
“The main point is not to keep the train away, it’s to show the world there is still a need to demonstrate against this scandal,” said Eggert, blocking a road in Hitzacker in his wheelchair.
The shipment is the first to the site since last November, when demonstrators defied some 17,500 police and staged sit-down protests along the route through Germany.
An estimated 10,000 to 15,000 officers throughout Germany were deployed for the latest transport.
Spent fuel from Germany’s 19 nuclear power plants is sent to France and Britain for reprocessing under contracts that oblige Germany to take back the waste.