Yamashita's remarks about radiation-contaminated water expected to create a stir

TEPCO President Naomi Hirose bows in apology for the contaminated water leakage after a related meeting at TEPCO headquarters in Tokyo on September 13, 2013.
TEPCO President Naomi Hirose bows in apology for the contaminated water leakage after a related meeting at TEPCO headquarters in Tokyo on September 13, 2013.

 

According to Kyodo News on September 13, Kazuhiko Yamashita, an executive of Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) that runs the Fukushima nuclear power plant, said that he does not think that the current situation is under control. He expressed his opinion at the Democratic Party's meeting of the Nuclear Emergency Response Headquarters in Koriyama City, Fukushima Prefecture. 

The TEPCO official is in charge of planning long-term countermeasures for the shutdown of Fukushima’s first reactor. 

Yamashita’s comments squarely repudiate Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s assurance at the International Olympic Committee (IOC) meeting in Buenos Aries on September 7. He said that contaminated water had been “completely blocked.”

On September 12, TEPCO also denied Abe’s remarks by saying, “Some amount of tritium was discharged into the Pacific Ocean.”

Akihiro Ohata, secretary general of the Democratic Party, said, "I will ask the prime minister to explain what he said last week by convening a special Diet session sooner than originally planned."

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