A rescuer holds the unchained hand of an anti-nuclear protester being removed from the railway tracks before the arrival of the transport train in Hitzacker. The transport has to stop again and again because of the blockades - it takes longer than any such transport did before. It started on Wednesday, 4pm in Valognes, France and has to make 1,200 kilometres. Now it is on its final 20 kilometres (12 miles)

Photograph: Christian Charisius/AFP/Getty Images