The infamous Chernobyl nuclear plant, site of the world's worst civil nuclear accident in 1986, was finally and irreversibly shut down Friday, Ukrainian television showed.
A white-clad nuclear engineer pulled a black emergency switch deactivating reactor number three -- the only one still in operation at the decrepit plant in northwest Ukraine -- at 1:17 PM (1117 GMT) Friday.
Seconds later, the flashing monitor in the plant's control room showed the activity level of the reactor slowly descending, the dramatic television images revealed.
Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma gave a nationwide television address before giving the order to definitively shut down the nuclear plant, as part of a 2.3-billion-dollar (2.6-billion-euro) deal with the world's richest nations, who donated the money to help finance the country's energy needs.
Representatives from a dozen countries, including Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov and US Energy Secretary Bill Richardson, joined some 2,000 guests for the shutdown ceremony held at the Ukrainian Palace in the capital Kiev.
Chernobyl's reactor number two was destroyed in a fire in 1991, while number one was shut down in 1996.
An estimated 15,000 to 30,000 people have died as a result of the April 26, 1986, explosion at Chernobyl's now defunct reactor number four, which spewed radiation into the atmosphere equivalent to 500 times that of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945 -- CHERNOBYL (AFP)
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