The Virginia NAACP unanimously passed a resolution urging the state to keep its three-decade ban on uranium mining.
Discussed this week at its annual convention, the NAACP said the risks outweigh the benefits.
“The magnitude of potential impacts on people of color and all the people in Virginia is too great to leave it to chance,” NAACP Executive Director King Salim Khalifani said in a press release.
“Uranium mining is a bad deal for Southside and a bad deal for Virginia,” said Naomi Hodge-Muse, president of the Martinsville-Henry County NAACP where the resolution was initially passed. “The industry wants us to sit still, but the health of our communities is too important not to speak out and protect it.”
Virginia Uranium Inc. proposes to mine a 119-million pound deposit, considered one of the largest in North America, near Chatham – if the Virginia legislature will lift its moratorium, imposed 30 years ago.
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http://www.sovanow.com/index.php?/news/article/state_naacp_backs_uranium_mine_ban/
