August 22, 2013
Japanese Communist Party parliamentarians on August 21 visited Fukushima Prefecture to conduct hearings with local fishermen about the damage caused by the radioactive water leak at the Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.
At a fishery co-operative in Iwaki City, a representative of local fishermen criticized the national government and TEPCO for their irresponsible attitude toward the accident by saying, “If we continue to just leave it to them, the fishing industry in Fukushima will collapse.”
Nozaki Tetsu, chairman of the Fukushima Prefectural Federation of Fisheries Co-operatives Associations, said, “The central government should show more of a commitment and take a lead in a national project to bring the accident under control.”
At the Soma Futaba fishery co-operative, which started test fishing in June last year and is currently catching 16 fish species on a trial basis, one of the participants said to the JCP members, “If we will be able to step up to a full-fledged operation or not depends on how the situation develops. In other words, it determines if we will have hope or despair for our futures. I do not want young fishermen in their teens or 20s to lose hope.”
The JCP team responded to them by promising to push the government to retract its declaration that the Fukushima accident is under control. The JCP lawmakers also stated that the countermeasures against the water leak should be drastically revised and the national government should take a leading role in tackling the accident under the recognition that it is in a state of emergency.
Member of the House of Councilors Kami Tomoko, and members of the House of Representatives Takahashi Chizuko, Kasai Akira, and Shiokawa Tetsuya took part in the series of hearings.
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On the same day, the Nuclear Regulation Authority decided to upgrade the severity level of the radioactive water leak at the Fukushima Daiichi Plant from level 1 (“Anomaly”) to level 3 (“Serious incident”) on the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale (INES).
At a fishery co-operative in Iwaki City, a representative of local fishermen criticized the national government and TEPCO for their irresponsible attitude toward the accident by saying, “If we continue to just leave it to them, the fishing industry in Fukushima will collapse.”
Nozaki Tetsu, chairman of the Fukushima Prefectural Federation of Fisheries Co-operatives Associations, said, “The central government should show more of a commitment and take a lead in a national project to bring the accident under control.”
At the Soma Futaba fishery co-operative, which started test fishing in June last year and is currently catching 16 fish species on a trial basis, one of the participants said to the JCP members, “If we will be able to step up to a full-fledged operation or not depends on how the situation develops. In other words, it determines if we will have hope or despair for our futures. I do not want young fishermen in their teens or 20s to lose hope.”
The JCP team responded to them by promising to push the government to retract its declaration that the Fukushima accident is under control. The JCP lawmakers also stated that the countermeasures against the water leak should be drastically revised and the national government should take a leading role in tackling the accident under the recognition that it is in a state of emergency.
Member of the House of Councilors Kami Tomoko, and members of the House of Representatives Takahashi Chizuko, Kasai Akira, and Shiokawa Tetsuya took part in the series of hearings.
***
On the same day, the Nuclear Regulation Authority decided to upgrade the severity level of the radioactive water leak at the Fukushima Daiichi Plant from level 1 (“Anomaly”) to level 3 (“Serious incident”) on the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale (INES).
