Top Secret RESOLUTION OF THE CC CPSU On the letter from a group of participants in the liquidation of the accident at the Chernobyl NPS received by the Central Committee CPSU 1 It should be noted that the letter of the group of participants in the fire-fighting operations and liquidation of the accident at the Chernobyl NPS Nuclear Power Station rightly bears witness to the facts of an unacceptably heartless bureaucratic attitude to the solution of issues related to the organization of treatment and financial welfare support for those afflicted in the process of the liquidation of the accident at Chernobyl attached 2 Instruct the Operative Group of the Politburo of the CC CPSU to deal with the referred to facts with due diligence to take decisive action to prevent them in the future and to punish those guilty in this situation Secretary of the CC For Comrades Gorbachev Ryzhkov Ligachyov Zaykov Sherbitsky Dolgikh Razumovsky Smirtyukov 30 10 86 To CHIEF EDITOR OF PRAVDA NEWSPAPER MEMBER OF THE CC CPSU ACADEMICIAN AFANASIEV V G We from among the 172 participants in the fire-fighting operations and the liquidation of the accident at the Chernobyl NPS are suffering radiation sickness and other varieties of acute radiation illness and are currently staying in the 'Rai-Yelenovka' sanatorium in the Kharkov region of the Kharkov oblast Five months have already passed since the accident All this time we have been optimistic about a quick recovery and so the issues that we want to pose today did not worry us before The first is the restoration and strengthening of our health in the autumn-winter period The worsening weather conditions increase the likelihood of the emergence of every kind of cold-related disease acute respiratory disease and flu And what their consequences will be is still unknown In addition the real issue of our further recovery has not been resolved After in-patient treatment for the last 3 months our medical condition is not being monitored by specialist doctors familiar with radiation sickness and there is also a lack of regular medical check-ups The clothes in which we arrived at the sanatorium in the summer are no longer suited to the season and to buy 'normal' warm things in our situation is practically impossible no one provides assistance in assigning us supplies from any store and we will probably need it for years We are also interested in the issue of care assistance and material support for the restoration of our health from the Red Cross and the State Insurance of the USSR which have not made concrete decisions on these issues On July 20 1986 our representative Comrade A I Panchenko tried to find out at the national committee of the Red Cross Kiev 30 Pushkinskaya St the possibility of receiving aid But instead of a welcoming reception he had to endure the secretary's answer in the waiting room There are a lot of you and the head of the department's answer We can give out aid in the sum of 15 rubles But we were better welcomed at the committee of the Red Cross in Kharkov Everywhere they say the following You get a salary so get treatment The residents of the 30-kilometer zone have received many miscellaneous compensations We learn about this from the newspapers and hear about it on the radio and on television It is apparent that all global problems are resolved in a very short timeframe and under the constant supervision of the leading party bodies We on the other hand despite greatly undermined health were left entirely on the sidelines We are not using any privileges Even buying a railway ticket at a ticket window is a problem To stand for a long stretch of time in a line is difficult So it is necessary hoping for human understanding to ask to be served ahead of the line as if begging for 'alms ' And even something that would seem like the most necessary thing for us now - medicines prescribed by specialists in clinics and hospitals in Kiev - are also not so easy to obtain There is one more issue on which we would like to have some kind of definite clarity - the activation of Account 904 the fund to provide aid to those injured as a result of the accident at the Chernobyl NPS - at the very least that's what it was called at the beginning Now we communicate constantly with those who in the first days after the accident made transfers to Account 904 But when they ask how much money we received from this fund frankly speaking we don't know what to respond All the types of aid that the evacuees have received as one can see in the central newspapers have been taken from the state budget And where is Account 904 We are also worried about the issue of the provision of housing So far no one has received equivalent housing They started to offer rooms in dormitories to single people instead of individual apartments as they were supposed to receive The problem of adequate nutrition is not resolved even for our comrades who are already returning to work The position of the trade union committee the administration and indeed the doctors which they took in regards to radiation sickness and its various manifestations is not very clear They do not equate it to a work injury i e the corresponding documents have still not been issued For some reason they all think that this sickness is a type of flu or acute respiratory disease only lengthier in duration Could it be true that they only needed us there at the nuclear power station when we were still healthy fellows We are well aware and even proud because we did not suffer in vain and not only in terms of the fastest possible liquidation of the accident at the NPS Now we see how the Chernobyl tragedy has shaken the world It has once again proved to all rationally thinking humanity the need to fight for peace and therefore the need to implement those plans for disarmament that our party has proposed Dear Victor Grigorievich We kindly ask you to report everything laid out in the letter to the Politburo CC CPSU The letter was composed on October 21 1986 and printed in 15 copies On behalf of those who extinguished the fire and liquidated the accident at the Chernobyl NPS Source Russian and Eastern European Documents Database Russian State Archive of Contemporary History Fond 89 p 53 d 21 Translated by Sarah Dunn for the National Security Archive This document is from the holdings of The National Security Archive Suite 701 Gelman Library The George Washington University 2130 H Street NW Washington D C 20037 Phone 202 994-7000 Fax 202 994-7005 nsarchiv@gwu edu