HAGATNA, 20 JUNE 2024 (ABC PACIFIC) — Anti-nuclear advocates in Guam say despite a recent setback in the US Senate, they’ll be pushing for compensation for people who were exposed to deadly radiation during nuclear tests in the Pacific.
The U.S carried out 67 nuclear tests in the Marshall Islands between 1946 and 1958, which also dispersed deadly radiation elsewhere in the Pacific to so-called ‘downwinders.’
Guam had hoped to be included in an amended Radiation Exposure Compensation Act but the programme was not renewed by the U.S House of Representatives earlier this month, leaving its future in doubt.
Robert Celestial, president for the Pacific Association for Radiation Survivors Guam, says an unincorporated territory doesn’t have a say on the floor of congress.
“There are folks (survivors) still alive today, if they had passed this earlier, it would have helped alot of people…some of the frontline communities are really disappointed but we’re not going to give up,” he said…. PACNEWS