Ukraine denies legal status to Chernobyl settlers

The 30-kilometre exclusion zone around the Chernobyl nuclear power plant remains unsafe, and the Ukrainian authorities are not prepared to grant a legal status to an estimated 200 to 2,000 people who have occupied evacuated properties within the radius.
Social Affairs Minister Natalya Korolevskaya spoke about this to the media in Kiev Wednesday two days ahead of the 27th anniversary of the Chernobyl reactor fire that unfolded into the world’s worst ever nuclear accident.

She said she believes up to 150 people may be dwelling illegally in the town of Chernobyl alone.

Several thousand other people, however, live in the exclusion zone quite legally. They are employees of Ukrainian operations to clean up radiation, maintain the three mothballed reactors and build a new steel-and-concrete casing around the damaged reactor.