On Wikipedia the "Tchernobyl: 4000 deaths" false claim published in a press release was relayed by an anonymous contributor, albeit it falsely stated that the underlying report was definitive, encompassing all illnesses and published by UN bodies.

At least a warning was proposed, without any effect.

Then, 7 months later, after release of the real definitive UN report (9000 deaths in a subset of the population and for only a family of illnesses) some history-rewriting took place, by simply replacing ''4,000'' with ''9,000', as if ''9,000'' was published since Sept. 2005, and without any account of the new perimeter (solid cancers and subset of exposed population, instead of grand total, and real UN report).

No one detailed, in the Wikipedia article, the disinformation nor the plain fact that no rectifying was published by the during or after the 7-months long period between the draft report and the UN version.

Then a talk led to a partial fix. But some dis (or mis)-information stays there, and nobody seems to care.

Worse: on Wikipedia (French edition) some try to conceal or minimize the disinformation campain.

Here is a complete account, with all pointers to evidence.

Just so that we don't get too confused, what should it say?

This may be a good start.

It can't have anything to do with the fact that the soviet union was a fucked up place, and simultaneously a terrible record keeper (missing nukes much), a staunch disinformation/propaganda provider, and a secretive government that kept tight wraps on any information of the type? And russia today is no better under putin?

I don't see what's the problem here, just edit the article to reflect what kind of casualties the number encompasses.

The IAEA disinformed (published "Chernobyl: 4,000 deaths, total, scientific, definitive result established by the United Nations", this was not scientific nor definitive nor accepted by the UN) and there is no way to establish this on Wikipedia.

Just find some reliable sources that disagree.

This ended in fights about what a "reliable" source is.

The case seems pretty simple:

"Scientific", by definition, implies that the authors are known and that the study was peer-reviewed. The "4,000 deaths, grand total" assertion is not scientific, albeit touted as scientific by the press release. WP nonetheless relays the "it is scientific" assertion. However I can understand that this is not absolutely clear for all.

"Definitive", by definition, implies that there can not be further modifications. The results announced in Sept 2005 as "definitive" ("4000 deaths, grand total") were modified ("9000 deaths by cancer in the most exposed 6.6 million people group") in the (real) definitive report published in April 20006. Therefore the "4,000..." were not "definitive", and this contradiction is not stated in WP. A body publishing "4,000! Total! Definitive!" then "9,000 in a subset!" is contradicting itself, this is carefully hidden, in WP, by a mob regulating articles contents.

"UN report" means that the UN published it. The UN did not, they only officially endorsed the (different) report in April 2006. Therefore this was not an UN report, albeit presented as such. No one can show a proof that it was published by the UN (the UN only relayed it) and the UN website has a complete public archive of all material officially endorsed, therefore the press release (Sept 2005) touting "4,000..." as stated in an UN report was a blatant lie. WP does not state it. Worse: WP, till a few minutes ago, misquoted the evaluation by forgetting about the (real) definitive version of the report. I fixed it, let's see. Take a look at the length of the period during which the blatantly false information ("4,000 among 6.6 million", albeit the correct quote from the report which URL flanks the quote is "4,000 in 6e5 and 5,000 in 6e6": read the report, page 106, first and 2nd paragraph) was published in WP.

I pity the poor reader "informed" by such crap, and the French edition of WP is much worse upon those atomic energy-related matters.

The problem is with the Soviet itself, it did everything to underreport the number of casualties, it was almost criminal. Any such estimates provided by the Soviet were almost always underestimation of the actual figures. I had a similar problem in the past, the Sumgait pogrom, which Soviet figures place it as a ridiculously low 32 deaths, and POV pushers were using this, knowing full well that it can not make any sense.

Since Wikipedia many times deal with some speciic informations not much is known, you'll have such problems. In such cases it is always better to not put anything then mislead.

I disagree as the autonomous 'system' formed by (on only by) IAEA's press releases and reports contains lies. There is no need, here, for any tier material.



That's true, but that's distinct from IAEA's manoeuvers



I agree. Note: this 'Sumgait progrom' case is also independent, in other words: WP states that this estimation was published by the procurator, which is enough for informed people, there is no need to quote other (say Azeri's) evaluations.



When something is blatantly misleading WP must, in my opinion, state it objectively. The Chernobyl disaster does not show that the IAEA published something as "definitive, ONU", let it spread, then discreetly published another real report.



This is an opinion, but I'm affraid that "misleading" is somewhat subjective. Did the IAEA publish "ONU and definitive" along with a given evaluation ("4,000 deaths, total")? Anyone can prove it. Did they, then publish, real ONU and (prolly?) definitive evaluation ("9,000 death in a subset")? Anyone can prove it. Wikipedia's pro-nuke mob superbly masks this.