June 23, 2013

Japanese Communist Party Lower House member Kasai Akira demanded on June 21 that the government make every effort not to discharge radioactively contaminated water into the ocean.

Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), the operator of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, has been cooling the spent nuclear fuel that had melted due to the accident that occurred in March 2011. The water used for cooling, mixed with groundwater seeping into the reactor buildings, has been accumulating at a pace of 400 tons per day.

In a session of the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee, Kasai pointed to TEPCO’s plan to release the radiated water into the sea. “As a party to the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, Japan has a duty to prevent marine pollution. It is totally unacceptable for the administration to allow the power company to discharge the water into the ocean,” he stressed.

The JCP parliamentarian pointed out that the total amount of radiation the water contains is equivalent to about ten times as much as that emitted to the atmosphere after the nuclear disaster. He noted that local fishermen are raising voices in protest against the proposed discharge.

Foreign Minister Kishida Fumio replied, “We will make efforts to ease public uneasiness concerning the planned discharge and work to gain international understanding for that.”

Kasai demanded again that the Abe Cabinet take all possible measures to avoid the release of the radiation-tainted water into the ocean.