FUKUSHIMA VICTIM'S TESTIMONY TO U.N.,TEPCO'S PALTRY SETTLEMENT AND SHINZO ABE'S SILENT NUCLEAR WAR

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THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY SHOULD CALL UPON SHINZO ABE TO DEMONSTRATE THE SAFETY OF THE AREA AROUND THE FUKUSHIMA DAI'ICHI NUCLEAR POWER PLANT BY MOVING THERE HIMSELF, BY MOVING HIS ENTIRE FAMILY THERE, AND BY REQUIRING ALL JAPANESE POLITICAL OFFICIALS TO ALSO MOVE THERE AND HOLD ALL THEIR GOVERNMENTAL SESSIONS IN FUKUSHIMA PREFECTURE FOR THE NEXT TWO YEARS, UP TO THE 2020 OLYMPICS.

LET THEM BE REQUIRED TO EAT ONLY FOOD GROWN IN FUKUSHIMA, DRINK WATER ONLY FROM FUKUSHIMA, SEND THEIR CHILDREN TO THE SCHOOLS THERE WHERE THOUSANDS OF BAGS OF RADIOACTIVE DEBRIS ARE STACKED IN SCHOOLYARDS, AND HAVE THEM ALL HIKE IN THE FORESTS THERE DAILY.

THEN, AND ONLY THEN, CAN THE WORLD SEE HOW SAFE IT IS TO ATTEND THE OLYMPICS AND HOW SAFE IT IS FOR EVACUEES TO BE FORCED BACK INTO VILLAGES THAT ARE KNOWN TO BE HOT-SPOTS OF HIGH RADIOACTIVITY TODAY, AFTER 6 YEARS OF "DECONTAMINATION".

ONE CANNOT DECONTAMINATE FORESTS, FARMLAND, RIVERS AND STREAMS, GRASS AND OTHER VEGETATION, NOR HAS ANYONE STOPPED THE DAILY RE-CONTAMINATION BY THE STILL-LEAKING REACTORS AT THAT POWER PLANT, AND BY JAPAN'S NEED TO KEEP OPEN-AIR BURNING OF SO MUCH RADIOACTIVE DEBRIS AS JAPAN CONTINUES TO VAINLY ATTEMPT CLEANUP FROM THAT DISASTER.

LET THEM ALL BE THOROUGHLY TESTED BEFORE THEIR MOVE TO FUKUSHIMA AND CLOSELY MONITORED BY UNBIASED, INDEPENDENT, RANDOMLY CHOSEN TESTING FACILITIES EVERY THREE MONTHS FOR TWO YEARS TO SEE WHAT EFFECT THIS WOULD HAVE ON THEM.

Mitsuko Sonoda, who voluntarily left her village with her husband and their 10-year-old son days after three reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant went into meltdown, will tell the UN human rights council that evacuees face financial hardship and are being forced to return to neighborhoods they believe are still unsafe almost seven years after the disaster.

“We feel abandoned by the Japanese government and society,” Sonoda, who will speak at the council’s pre-session review of Japan on Thursday, told the Guardian.

While 1 mSv per year remains the government’s long-term target, it is encouraging people to return to areas where radiation levels are above 20 mSv a year, an annual exposure limit that, internationally, applies to nuclear power plant workers.

“Why should people, especially women and children, have to live in places where the radiation level is 20 times the international limit?” Sonoda said. “The government hasn’t given us an answer.”

“People should be allowed to choose whether or not to go back to their old homes, and be given the financial means to make that choice,” said Kendra Ulrich, senior global energy campaigner for Greenpeace Japan.

“If they are being put under economic pressure to return, then they are not in a position to make an informed decision. This UN session is about pressuring the Japanese government to do the right thing.”

In Iitate village, where the evacuation order was lifted this March, much of the surrounding forests remain highly radioactive, although homes, schools and other public buildings have been declared safe as part of an unprecedented decontamination effort.

“You could call places like Iitate an open-air prison,” said Ulrich. “The impact on people’s quality of life will be severe if they move back. Their lives are embedded in forests, yet the environment means they will not be allowed to enter them.
Forests are impossible to decontaminate.”

After months of moving around, Sonoda and her family settled in Kyoto for two years, where local authorities provided them with a rent-free apartment. They have been living in her husband’s native England for the past four years.

Concern over food safety and internal radiation exposure convinced her that she could never return to Fukushima, aside from making short visits to see relatives. “It’s really sad, because my village is such a beautiful place,” she said. “We had a house and had planned to retire there.”

“Stopping housing support earlier this year was an act of cruelty,” Sonoda said. “Some of my friends had to go back to Fukushima even though they didn’t want to.”

The evacuations have forced families to live apart, while parents struggle to earn enough money to fund their new accommodation and keep up mortgage payments on their abandoned homes.

An estimated 27,000 evacuees who, like Sonoda, were living outside the mandatory evacuation zone when the meltdown occurred, had their housing assistance withdrawn this March, forcing some to consider returning to their former homes despite concerns over radiation levels.

In addition, as the government attempts to rebuild the Fukushima region by reopening decontaminated neighborhoods that were once no-go areas, tens of thousands of evacuees who were ordered to leave will lose compensation payments and housing assistance in March next year.

IN CASE YOU DON'T KNOW, EVACUEES FROM THE CHERNOBYL EXCLUSION ZONE HAVE NO HOPE OF BEING ALLOWED BACK IN FOR AT LEAST 40 MORE YEARS.

CHERNOBYL WAS CONTAINED, FUKUSHIMA MAY NEVER BE CONTAINED, BY TEPCO'S OWN ADMISSION, CLAIMING THAT THE TECHNOLOGY TO DO SO DOES NOT EXIST AND WILL TAKE DECADES TO DEVELOP.

CHERNOBYL WAS ONE REACTOR MELT-DOWN, FUKUSHIMA HAD AT LEAST THREE...SO FAR.

CHERNOBYL DOES NOT SIT ATOP A MAJOR FAULT LINE WITH THE THREAT OF MAJOR EARTHQUAKES 24 HOURS A DAY, NOR DOES IT SIT ON AN ISLAND SPRINKLED WITH ACTIVE VOLCANOES, NOR DOES CHERNOBYL EXPERIENCE FREQUENT TYPHOONS, NOR IS IT LOCATED WHERE IT CAN BE HIT BY TSUNAMIS... BUT FUKUSHIMA IS DAILY IN DANGER OF A 'NATURAL EVENT' THAT WILL TOPPLE THOSE WEAKENED BUILDINGS, OR INUNDATE THEM AGAIN AND RECREATE THE ORIGINAL DISASTER.

THEY LOCATED THE CORIUM AT CHERNOBYL AND BUILT A SARCOPHAGUS OVER IT, BUT THE CORIUM AT DAI'ICHI HAS NOT BEEN LOCATED AND SINCE JAPAN'S CRIPPLED PLANT SITS DIRECTLY OVER A MAJOR AQUIFER THAT FEEDS INTO TOKYO'S WATER SUPPLY 24 HOURS A DAY AND THERE IS RUNOFF BENEATH THE LEAKING PLANT AFTER EVERY RAIN THAT CARRIES RADIATION INTO THE PACIFIC OCEAN , A SARCOPHAGUS IS NOT AN OPTION.

THE RADIATION FROM DAI'ICHI HAS BEEN HIGHER THAN ANYTHING MEASURED BEFORE ON EARTH.
EACH YEAR SINCE THE MELTDOWNS, RADIATION LEVELS HAVE REACHED NEW RECORD HIGHS, BUT SINCE TEPCO IS DOING THE MONITORING, SELF-REPORTING, WE MAY NEVER KNOW THE TRUTH OF THOSE LEVELS.
BOTH THE ABE REGIME AND TEPCO HAVE BEEN CAUGHT IN MORE LIES THAN THEIR OWN NEWS MEDIA CAN KEEP TRACK OF.

The denial of financial aid has left many evacuees facing a near-impossible choice: move back to homes they fear are unsafe, or face more financial hardship as they struggle to build lives elsewhere without state help.

Greenpeace Japan, which is assisting Sonoda, hopes her testimony will be the first step in building international pressure on Japan’s government to continue offering financial help to evacuees and to reconsider its resettlement plan.

It has called on the government to declare Fukushima neighborhoods unsafe until atmospheric radiation is brought to below one millisievert (mSv) a year, the maximum public exposure limit recommended by the International Commission on Radiological Protection.

“Although most Fukushima nuclear evacuees meet the criteria for consideration as Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), the Japanese government has refused to acknowledge them as such and ignored international frameworks for their protection.”

ABE WON'T COMPENSATE THE VICTIMS BUT HE WILL SPEND BILLIONS TO BRING THE WORLD TO TOKYO FOR THE OLYMPICS, AND HE WILL PERHAPS SMILE KNOWING ALL WHO VISIT RECEIVED DOSES OF FUKUSHIMA RADIATION.

Earlier this week, a court in Fukushima prefecture ordered the Japanese government and the TEPCO nuclear operator to pay out about 500 million yen ($4.44 million) in compensation – less than $1,200 per claimant.

The class-action suit was filed by about 3,800 people, the largest group among about 30 similar lawsuits involving 12,000 people pending across the country.

BOTH OWNER AND GOVERNMENT FOUND GUILTY.

The operator (TEPCO) was found guilty of failing to adopt the necessary safety measures despite knowing of potentially devastating consequences in case of a massive tsunami as early as 2002. The government, the court said, failed to supervise the operator prior to the disaster.

The court in Fukushima said the government had failed to order Tepco to improve safety measures, despite being aware almost a decade earlier that Japan’s north-east coast, where the plant is located, was at risk of a powerful tsunami.

The plaintiffs based their claim on a 2002 report in which government experts estimated there was a one in five chance of a magnitude 8 earthquake occurring and triggering a tsunami of up to 15.7 metres in height within the next 30 years.

The court upheld the plaintiffs’ claims that the meltdown could have been prevented if the ministry responsible for Japan’s nuclear power industry had ordered Tepco to move emergency diesel generators from the plant’s basement to higher ground and make the reactor buildings watertight.

The ruling by the Fukushima district court follows an earlier decision that also found the government accountable for the disaster, in which large quantities of radiation was released and tens of thousands of people were forced to flee their homes.

The class action lawsuit, involving 3,800 plaintiffs, is the largest of about 30 similar cases filed by 12,000 Fukushima residents who say their lives were adversely affected by the triple meltdown and its aftermath.

In March, a court ruled for the first time that negligence by the state contributed to the events at Fukushima Daiichi, the world’s worst nuclear accident...

The court rejected a demand for monthly compensation of 55,000 yen until radiation at the plaintiffs’ homes has fallen to pre-disaster levels.

THAT'S BECAUSE THAT POWER PLANT WILL NEVER STOP LEAKING AND RE-CONTAMINATING JAPAN AND THE WORLD.
HOW CAN RADIATION LEVELS DROP WHEN IT LEAKS LIKE A SIEVE EVERY DAY, ALL DAY?
HOW CAN LEVELS DROP WHEN THE ABE REGIME KEEPS STACKING FLIMSY PLASTIC BAGS EVERYWHERE AND KEEPS OPEN-AIR BURNING WASTE AND DEBRIS?

CLEANUP WILL TAKE ANOTHER 40-100 YEARS AT LEAST, BY TEPCO'S OWN ADMISSION, EVEN WITH FOREIGN HELP, BUT JAPAN HAS REFUSED HELP BECAUSE TEPCO AND THE JAPANESE GOVERNMENT ARE AFRAID OF WHAT ANY INTERNATIONAL TEAMS MIGHT DISCOVER...PERHAPS THAT THEY WERE ENRICHING URANIUM IN HOPES OF BUILDING 'THE BOMB'?
AFTER ALL, ABE HAS STATED THAT JAPAN NEEDS TO BE AS WELL ARMED AS ITS NEIGHBORS, CHINA AND NORTH KOREA, SO IT CAN DEFEND ITSELF.

ABE HAS CLAIMED JAPAN'S "RIGHT" TO HAVE ATOMIC WEAPONS SINCE HE BEGAN TO RISE THROUGH THE POLITICAL RANKS.

HE IS ALSO VERY BITTER ABOUT HIS GRANDFATHER'S TREATMENT AS A CRIMINAL AFTER THE WAR.

AN ARTICLE BY A WEBSITE ON JAPANESE "SUBCULTURE" TELLS IT LIKE IT IS:
"War clouds threaten northeast Asia. One state within the region continues to raise its military spending to record levels over five consecutive years. It increases solid-fuel rocket testing under the guise of launching satellites into orbit and continues stockpiling vast reserves of plutonium that could potentially nuclear arm the nation. New domestic laws severely limit the media, and active discussion persists on bills that would crack down on socially unacceptable or controversial thinking—i.e., “thoughtcrime.”

These ever-belligerent, destabilizing actions are not the actions of a rogue state. No, this isn’t about North Korea, Iran, or Russia for that matter, but the remilitarization of Japan.

The nationalist administration, led by the grandson of a war criminal, Shinzo Abe* (Liberal Democratic Party), uses recent activities in North Korea to its benefit, pounding war drums alongside most established media organizations, both on the left and the right, such as the Asahi, Mainichi, and Yomiuri Shimbun newspapers.
(*Editor’s note: Prime Minister Shinzo Abe (2012-) had a grandfather who was ARRESTED, but not convicted as a war criminal, and who served as Minister of Munitions during World War II–Nobusuke Kishi. Kishi raised Abe like his own son, and Abe’s stated desire to fulfill his grandfather’s dreams of dismantling the post-war constitution and restoring a State Shinto controlled Imperial government probably owes much to his childhood. But his childhood dreams could be a nightmare for a democratic Japan.)

This “threat” from its mainland neighbor is forced down the throats of Japanese citizens daily. Tokyo rehashes wartime imperialist ideologies, senior cabinet ministers stating support for using the Imperial Rescript of Education by schools—a text promulgated in 1890 in the name of Emperor Meiji that placed utmost importance in reverence and loyalty to the crown—as a means to foster the administration’s values in today’s youth. (It was also to justify the use of kamikaze, suicide missions in mini-submarines, and the forced suicide of thousands of Okinawans.)


THAT SHINZO ABE HAS GONE OUT OF HIS WAY AND AGAINST THE WISHES OF MOST OF HIS PEOPLE TO REIGNITE JAPAN'S "RISING SUN" AS A WAR POWER CAN BE SEEN IN THE ARTICLE
"Yasukuni and the Enshrinement of War Criminals" ORIGINALLY WRITTEN IN JAPANESE AND TRANSLATED TO SHOW THE MILITANCY OF THE ABE REGIME AND HIS INTENT FOR JAPAN TO RE-MILITARIZE.

"The advent of the second Abe Shinzō cabinet has rekindled the bitter controversy over official visits to Yasukuni Shrine, where war criminals are honored alongside Japan’s other war dead. Diplomatic historian Higurashi Yoshinobu sheds light on the process that culminated in the secret enshrinement of Class A war criminals in 1978.

World War II war criminals are people who were tried and convicted by any of the international military tribunals held by the Allies after the war to prosecute war crimes. In order to facilitate prosecution of those deemed responsible for the war and the atrocities associated with it, the Allied powers established three broad categories of war crime.

The first category was “crimes against peace” (Class A), defined as the “planning, preparation, initiation, or waging of wars of aggression,” or conspiracy to those ends. Although wars of aggression had been regarded as violations of international law prior to World War II, they had not been treated as criminal’s offenses for which individuals could be tried and punished. For this reason, the tribunals have been criticized for convicting and punishing people under ex post facto laws—statutes enacted only after the offense has taken place.

The second category (Class B) corresponded to conventional crimes of war, including the mistreatment of prisoners, murder of civilians in occupied territory, and wanton destruction of cities. All of these had been punishable under international law since before World War II.

The third category (Class C) was “crimes against humanity.” This covered widespread or systematic persecution and atrocities carried out against a group of people. This category was established by the Allies toward the end of World War II—again, ex post facto—to cover Nazi crimes carried out against German Jews and others in the lead-up to the war. As atrocities committed by a state against its own citizens, these crimes were not encompassed in the traditional definition of war crimes covered by Class B.

Notwithstanding the hierarchical nuance of “class,” (kyū in Japanese), the categorization does not necessarily refer to the severity of the crime. Class A war crimes are not by definition worse or more serious than Class B or C crimes. However, Class A war criminals have drawn much more much attention than Class B or C criminals in Japan, primarily because of their high rank and the manner in which they were tried.

The ultimate source of this ongoing conflict was the enshrinement of Class A war criminals in 1978. And the enshrinement of this group cannot be attributed simply to religious or filial impulses. In fact, it was a blatantly ideological and political act driven by an urge to justify and legitimize a highly controversial chapter in Japanese history."

IN 2013, Japan's Shinzo Abe angers neighbours and US by visiting shrine to war dead.


And in 2016, Japan PM Shinzo Abe visits Yasukuni WW2 shrine - BBC News


And in 2017, Abe sends ritual tree offering to Yasukuni


ON ANOTHER ISSUE, THAT OF KOREAN AND OTHER NATIONS' WOMEN TAKEN HOSTAGE AND USED AS "COMFORT WOMEN" IN BROTHELS PROVIDED TO JAPAN'S MILITARY, ABE AT FIRST REFUSED TO APOLOGIZE FOR THAT, BUT YIELDED TO INTERNATIONAL PRESSURE, WITH THE RESULT THAT SOUTH KOREA AND CHINA BECAME INCENSED AND REMAIN SO.


Japan's Abe says won't alter 1993 apology on 'comfort women' - Reuters


Abe confirms Japan not considering apology letters for 'comfort women'


Japan Second World War 'comfort women' apology criticised in China ..


THOSE IN THE WEST SEEM OBLIVIOUS TO THIS RISING MILITANCY FROM A 'RISING SON' OF THE RISING SUN, JUST AS OUR NUCLEAR INDUSTRY AND OUR NUCLEAR "REGULATORY" COMMISSION COVER UP THE ONGOING FUKUSHIMA ATROCITY WHICH MANY HAVE BEEN CALLING "SHINZO ABE'S SILENT NUCLEAR WAR" SINCE DAI'ICHI BLEW THE FIRST REACTOR.

SHINZO ABE SEEMS MORE THAN WILLING TO RISK THE HEALTH OF HIS OWN PEOPLE, TO IGNORE THE DANGER OF THE ONGOING RADIATION FROM FUKUSHIMA TO THE ENTIRE WORLD, TO THE ENTIRE PACIFIC RIM, INCLUDING AMERICA'S WEST COAST.

HE SEEMS TO BE A MAN ON A MISSION TO "PAY BACK" THE WORLD FOR JAPAN'S DEFEAT IN WORLD WAR II.

HE'S DOING A BANG-UP JOB.






//WW