NUCLEAR FALLOUT

"This is not the action of a good international citizen. It is not the action of a good neighbor." Australian Foreign Minister Gareth Evans expressed the feelings of many after France incurred widespread international disapproval by setting off an underground nuclear blast beneath the remote Mururoa Atoll in the South Pacific. The explosion made water boil in a lagoon at the atoll, but ships in a Greenpeace-led protest flotilla nearby could detect no sign of the test. The French decision to end a three-year moratorium on nuclear testing drew fire from dozens of nations around the world, including the U.S. New Zealand recalled its ambassador from Paris, and the tiny Pacific island nation of Nauru broke off relations entirely. "Countries are seriously upset about the testing," says TIME's Bruce Nelan in Washington. "But the threats are mostly symbolic. Any country that has a mutually beneficial economic relationship with France will not endanger that because of these blasts."