Japan announced on Tuesday that it will start dumping more than 1 million metric tons of treated radioactive water from the crashed Fukushima nuclear power plant on August 24, putting into effect a plan that has drawn strong criticism from China.
The plan, approved two years ago by the Japanese government as crucial to the decommissioning of the plant operated by the Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco), has also faced criticism from local fishermen's groups, who fear damage to their reputations and a threat to their livelihood.
"I have asked Tepco to prepare quickly for the water release in accordance with the plan approved by the Nuclear Regulatory Authority and I expect the water release to begin on August 24, weather conditions permitting," he said on Tuesday. in the morning the Prime Minister, Fumio Kishida.
The announcement comes a day after the government said it had gained "some degree of understanding" from the fishing industry about the dumping of the water, despite a group of fishermen saying they continued to fear the reputational damage would ruin livelihoods.
"I promise that we will take full responsibility to ensure that the fishing industry can continue to earn a living, even if it takes decades," Kishida said Monday.
Japan has said that the dumping of water is safe. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN nuclear watchdog, gave the plan the green light in July, saying it met international standards and that the impact it would have on people and the environment was "negligible". .
Some neighboring countries have expressed skepticism about the security of the plan, with Beijing as the main critic. Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said in July that Japan had shown selfishness and arrogance and had not fully consulted the international community on the water spill.
China bans seafood imports from Japan's 10 prefectures, including Fukushima and the capital Tokyo. Seafood imports from other prefectures are allowed, but they must pass tests for radioactivity and show that they were produced outside the 10 prohibited prefectures.
South Korean activists have also protested against the plan, though Seoul has concluded in its own study that the water release meets international standards and has said it complies with the IAEA assessment.
The Pacific island nations have been divided on the issue, given their own history as nuclear testing sites for the United States and France. Fiji's Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka issued a statement Monday endorsing the IAEA report but acknowledging that the issue is controversial in the Pacific islands.
Kishida said on Tuesday that he believed an "accurate understanding" of the matter was spreading in the international community. Japan claims that the water will be filtered to remove most radioactive elements, except for tritium, an isotope of hydrogen that is difficult to separate from water. The treated water will be diluted well below internationally approved tritium levels before it is discharged into the Pacific.
The water was used to cool the fuel rods of Fukushima Daiichi after it melted in an accident caused by a huge tsunami in 2011 that hit the eastern coast of Japan. A Japanese official said the first results of tests on the seawater after the spill could be available as early as September. Japan will also test the fish in the waters near the plant and publish the results on the website of the Ministry of Agriculture.
