"This was a wonderful town, a wonderful job, wonderful people. It was our youth. Then it all collapsed," she said. "If only you knew how much our hearts ache for our children, how many sick grandchildren there are, how many couples without kids.

Some 2,000 candles are lit to display a nuclear radiation warning sign during an anti-nuclear rally in Vienna April 25, 2011, on the eve of the 25th anniversary of the Chernobyl meltdown.[Photo/Agencies]

"We come here to look each other in the face. If it hadn't been for the people buried here, Kiev would no longer exist," Demchenko said.

Russia, Ukraine and Belarus have cut the benefits packages for sickened cleanup workers in recent years, and many workers complained directly to Russian President Dmitry Medvedev as he handed them awards for their work at a ceremony Monday in Moscow.

Officials in Bryansk, the Russian region most contaminated by the disaster, have failed to make necessary repairs at the local cancer hospital, worker Leonid Kletsov told the president.

"It's the only place of rest for us," he said. "Officials promised to renovate it, but these promises are still promises."

Chernobyl has come into renewed focus since an earthquake and tsunami triggered a nuclear disaster in Japan last month, with the country still struggling to bring the radiation-spewing Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant under control.

Japanese newspapers on Monday highlighted the significance of Chernobyl The Asahi interviewed a former Chernobyl worker under the headline: "Fukushima, don't tread the same route."

In Germany, thousands of people demonstrated on Monday near several nuclear power plants, demanding a speedy end to the use of atomic energy. Japan's crisis has prompted Germany to freeze plans to extend the life of its plants, order a temporary shutdown of its seven oldest reactors and seek a quicker transition to renewable energy.

In Austria, Chancellor Werner Faymann used an event in Vienna marking the 25th anniversary of Chernobyl to call for a nuclear-free Europe.