Thirty-one years ago this week, the world eyes focused on the Ukrainian city of Chornobyl, where the world's worst nuclear accident was contaminating large swaths of what was then called the Soviet Union. Three years ago, VOA's Steve Herman visited the area, photographing monuments and artifacts near the Chernobyl reactor site.
31 Years Later, Chernobyl Disaster Remembered
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The entrance to the restricted Chernobyl zone, in which no one, on the Ukrainian side, is allowed to live within 30 kilometers of the destroyed nuclear reactor. (Arash Arabasadi/VOA)
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A rusting ride for children in the highly radioactive abandoned amusement park in Pripyat. (Steve Herman/VOA)
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A monument commemorating permanently evacuated towns and villages inside the exclusion zone. (Steve Herman/VOA)
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A cashier uses an abacus at one of the few commercial establishments inside the Chernobyl exclusion zone. (Steve Herman/VOA)
