BERLIN — German police announced plans Monday to use 10,000 local and federal officers to ensure the free passage of a train that is to deliver nuclear waste to a disputed northern storage site early next week.

Police said they are bracing for about 5,000 protesters, in line with last year's turnout, but representatives from a local protest group said they anticipate closer to 3,000 demonstrators this year.

In recent weeks, an arson attempt and two rail-line attacks have occurred in advance of the delivery, police official Friedrich Niehoerster said. The train is scheduled to leave a reprocessing plant in La Hague in northwestern France on Saturday evening and arrive in the northern German town of Gorleben on Monday night.

Protesters have staged a total of 28 anti-atomic energy demonstrations and camps along the 1,600-kilometer (nearly 1,000-mile) route, Niehoerster said.

At last year's demonstration, a 21-year-old French protester died from injuries he received when he was run over by the train in eastern France.

Source: Associated Press