The war in Ukraine reminded us in 2022 of the danger of using nuclear weapons, and the real threat of our nuclear power plants if they ever become military targets, turning them into mega-atomic bombs.

However, the Kishida government has committed itself, from August 2022, to nuclear revival with the construction of new reactors, as well as the restart of existing reactors and the extension of their operating periods. This has been included in the “Green Transformation” policy decided by the Council of Ministers on February 10th, 2023. Faced with such a forced choice, after a very short online consultation, and even before the end of a “public debate” limited to only ten cities, we feel an even stronger anger towards the government than before.

The crippled plant is still facing various problems and is far from being safely dismantled. In seven municipalities of Fukushima, there are still so-called “difficult to return to” zones –areas where people are not allowed to stay, and several tens of thousands of refugees cannot return to their homes. Barely twelve years after the accident, the government has abandoned the principles that emerged from the reflections and lessons of the disaster: reducing dependence on nuclear power generation, limiting the operation of a reactor to forty years, and separating the nuclear regulator from the entity that promotes it.

Yes, it is reasonable to publicly express our concern after the stupidity of such a choice which leads straight to the risk of a new accident. That is why we must, once again, oppose this decision with all our might.

The status of the trials is also worrying. The Supreme Court’s verdict for four civil cases in June 2022 absolved the Japanese state of legal responsibility for the accident, overturning the three appeal rulings that had recognized such responsibility.

In the criminal trial against the former TEPCO executives, the appeal judgement of January 2023 confirmed their acquittal, on the grounds of “insufficient evidence”. However, the court had refused to hear important witnesses and even to visit the accident site for verification.

As for the lawsuit filed by the Fukushima authorities to dislodge the refugees from the housing they had been granted, the court condemned the latter without taking into account the international right to housing.

In all cases, the examination of evidence and witnesses remains insufficient, making these judgements unacceptable to the victims. This is why the plaintiffs in the criminal trial have decided to appeal to the Supreme Court. For our part, we will continue to argue and request additional hearings. But these unfair judgements may be related to the move towards a nuclear revival.

As for Fukushima, there is another serious issue, since the discharge of radioactive water from the plant into the sea will begin in several months. And this is expected to last for several decades. In December 2022, we organized an international forum with citizens from the Pacific Ocean who condemned this discharge of contaminated water into the marine environment as an unacceptable violation of the human rights of the people living on the Pacific Ocean and a serious threat to the life of aquatic organisms.

This has also led to protests from countries such as South Korea and China. The crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant has already released a huge amount of radioactive substances. But on top of that, the government and TEPCO will knowingly dump more contaminated water into the world’s oceans from Fukushima.

This hurts us, which is why we want this operation to be stopped at all costs. On April 13th, one year to the day after the decision to release the radioactive water into the sea, the people of Fukushima are calling for a worldwide protest action. Let us hope that this international solidarity action will be a success.

In spite of increasingly troubled times, let us continue to work with all our strength and perseverance for a bright future for coming generations.

March 2023 in Fukushima

Ruiko Muto

Chair of the Complainants for the Criminal Prosecution of the Fukushima Nuclear Disaster

http://hidanren.blogspot.com

http://kokuso-fukusimagenpatu.blogspot.com/p/blog-page_5112.html

(Translated from Japanese by Nos Voisins Lointains 3.11)

For the translation in other languages, please visit:

https://yosomono-net.jimdofree.com/english/

Zeronomikuma arrived in Berlin!  He flew all the way from Japan to join us in Kazaguruma Demo.

Despite his long flight and jet-lag, he joined our pinwheel-making&dance workshop last Saturday. We had fun making all the pinwhees which will be distributed at our Demo, we made over 600 pinwheels so far!   We thank all of those who participated in the workshop.  We are very much looking forward to meeting with you at Kazaguruma Demo on March 7th. Let us raise No Nukes pinwheels to the sky together!

Zeronomikuma is a popular Japanese mascot character who is promoting the phase-out of nuclear energy. He travels everywhere where anti-atom events take place to encourage people.  His blog (only Japanese):http://zeronomikuma.com/

Sayonara Nukes Berlin and Anti Atom Berlin submitted an open letter to Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on March 7th, 2014.

Through this open letter, we urge the Japanese government; 

• to phase out nuclear power by giving up the resumption of all nuclear power plant operations as well as the construction of new nuclear power plants,
• not to export nuclear technology to any other countries,
• to shut down the nuclear fuel reprocessing plant and the fast-breeder reactor, Monju,
• to make efforts to increase renewable energy capacities and to increase the government investment in schemes for energy efficiency,
• to undertake effective measures to prevent the further spread of radioactive contamination in Fukushima and the surrounding area as well as to stop outflow of contaminated water into the Pacific Ocean (including receiving international technical cooperation),
• to provide financial assistance with relocation costs to those who want to move out from the contaminated areas, especially families with children,
• not to promote the return of people back to the contaminated areas even though the decontamination work has been completed,
• to strictly observe that the satisfaction of reparation is given fairly to the victims by TEPCO,
• to intensify the support system for the victims, e.g.; to put the plan of action under the Victim Support Act immediately into effect ;  to provide the victims, especially children and clean-up workers with more frequent health check-ups as well as necessary medical treatment (including mental disorders),
• to strengthen the government supervision in order to secure fair wages to be paid to clean-up workers at Fukushima-Daiich as well as decontamination workers and temporary workers at other nuclear power plants without exploitation,
• to confine and manage radioactive waste produced by decommissioning of reactors at Fukushima-Daiichi in an appropriate manner according to its hazard levels,
• to clear the bags of contaminated soil and rubble (including ash) that are temporarily left in various places and store them safely in appropriate and isolated disposal facilities,
• to ensure transparency and accountability on nuclear issues and to exempt nuclear issues from the application of the Secret Information Protection Act.

47 prominent individuals and 20 organizations are also listed in the letter as supporters for our open letter.

Open_Letter_07032014_English

(for the list of supporters, please see the attachment in Japanese page or German page.)