ABSTRACT
The first attempts at a legal solution to Chernobyl's environmental and social problems came in the form of regulations approved jointly by the Central Committee of the Communist Party and the USSR Council of Ministers. In Soviet times, that was the usual practice in the absence of regular legislation. The Central Committee was seen as the main organ of state power, the party's leading role being enshrined in the Brezhnev constitution. The Chernobyl legislation in Ukraine, Russia, and Belorussia treats the global Chernobyl accident-related problems in two different ways. The first approach is territorial. It is based on the so-called territory zoning, defined above. The second approach is social. The laws aimed at social and economic protection of this country's citizens were adopted in the republics about a year before the Soviet Union's collapse. Several legislative acts and governmental resolutions deal with social protection in the country's various regions contaminated with radio nuclides as a result of nuclear accidents.
