South Korea mulls court fight over Japan s plan to release contaminated Fukushima water
South Korean President Moon Jae-in ordered officials on Wednesday to explore petitioning an international court over Japan s decision to release water from its Fukushima nuclear plant, his spokesman said, amid protests by fisheries and environmental groups.
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Thomson Reuters ·
Posted: Apr 14, 2021 4:16 AM ET | Last Updated: April 14
Members of the National Federation of Fisheries Cooperatives stage a rally in front of a building that houses the Japanese Embassy in Seoul, South Korea on Wednesday to denounce the Japanese government s decision on Fukushima water. (Ahn Young-joon/The Associated Press)
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SEOUL (Reuters) - South Korean President Moon Jae-in ordered officials on Wednesday to explore petitioning an international court over Japan’s decision to release water from its Fukushima nuclear plant, his spokesman said, amid protests by fisheries and environmental groups.
FILE PHOTO: South Korean President Moon Jae-in speaks at the National Assembly in Seoul, South Korea, October 28, 2020. Jeon Heon-Kyun/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo
Japan unveiled plans on Tuesday to release more than 1 million tonnes of contaminated water into the sea from the plant crippled by a 2011 earthquake and tsunami, starting in about two years after filtering it to remove harmful isotopes.
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April 14, 2021 by archyde
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The plan drew immediate opposition from its neighbors South Korea, China and Taiwan.
South Korea vigorously protested the decision, summoning Koichi Aiboshi, Tokyo’s ambassador to Seoul, and calling for an inter-agency emergency meeting to work out its response.
President Moon Jae-in said officials should seek ways to refer Japan’s measure to the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, including filing an injunction, his spokesman Kang Min-seok said at a briefing.
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A coalition of 25 fisheries organizations staged a rally and delivered a written protest to the embassy, urging Tokyo to revoke the decision and Seoul to ban imports of Japanese seafood.
“Our industry is on course to suffer annihilating damage, just with people’s concerns about a possible radioactive contamination of marine products,” it said in a statement.
The progressive minor opposition Justice Party and some 30 anti-nuclear and environmental groups called Japan’s move “nuclear terrorism,” and said they sent the Japanese embassy a list of signatures of more than 64,000 people opposed to the move collected from 86 countries since February.