Ship with nuclear waste enters Caribbean

The environmental organization Greenpeace reports that the British flagged freighter “Pacific Swan” has entered the Caribbean Sea with a controversial cargo of nuclear waste. It is scheduled to transit the Panama Canal on February sixth, on its way from France to Japan. CARICOM and several Latin American nations have protested the shipment and Greenpeace has called on the United States, which operates the canal, to conduct an environmental impact assessment before allowing the ship to enter the waterway. Greenpeace contends that the dangers of transporting nuclear waste have not been sufficiently studied and an accident at sea could have disastrous consequences for the marine environment.