The protestors, wearing black jackets with the nuclear energy symbol and their faces painted white, played dead on the ground while one demonstrator outlined the bodies with chalk.

"Nuclear energy is deadly," read a banner carried by the demonstrators.

Police took the activists into custody on charges of holding an illegal demonstration after they ignored orders to disperse, Greenpeace spokeswoman Hilal Atici told AFP.

The Turkish government plans to build three nuclear power plants with a total capacity of about 5,000 megawatts to become operational in 2012 in a bid to prevent a possible energy shortage and reduce dependence on foreign energy supplies, mainly from Russia and Iran.

But the plan and the possible site of the reactor -- Sinop, a coastal city on the Black Sea, 435 kilometers (270 miles) northeast of Ankara -- have triggered protests from residents and environmentalists.

Turkey had abandoned earlier plans to build a nuclear power plant in July 2000 amid financial difficulties and protests from environmentalists in Turkey and neighboring Greece and Cyprus.

Opponents argued that the proposed site -- Akkuyu, on the Mediterranean coast -- was only 25 kilometres (15 miles) from a seismic faultline.

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