May 30. (EUROPE PRESS) –
The South Korean Prime Minister, Han Duck Soo, on Tuesday asked the team of experts that inspected the Fukushima nuclear power plant to present the results of their analysis in a transparent and complete manner.
Han made the remarks during a cabinet meeting as critics — including the opposition Democratic Party — have claimed the inspection was merely a formality insufficient to verify the safety of the unloading process.
“Our Government has severely dealt with the Japanese Executive’s plan to release contaminated water under the absolute principle that the health and safety of people come first,” insisted the Prime Minister.
The inspection work of the treated water storage tanks from the Fukushima nuclear power plant carried out over the last week by a group of South Korean experts came to an end last Friday, so the experts returned to Seoul where they will analyze if the tons of treated water are safe enough to be discharged into the sea this summer, as the Japanese authorities foresee.
The team, made up of 21 experts and led by the chairman of the Nuclear Safety and Protection Commission, Yoo Guk Hee, tries to dispel doubts about the safety of the water during a six-day visit, which has included an inspection of the facilities to examine the water purification system and tanks designed to store radioactive substances.
This was the first such independent inspection by South Korean experts and follows an agreement reached by President Yoon Suk Yeol and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida earlier this month.
This week a team of experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is in Japan to discuss this proposal with the Japanese authorities.
The Japanese plan includes diluting contaminated water before it is discharged into the ocean to reduce tritium levels to one seventh of the World Health Organization (WHO) minimum for drinking water. The Fukushima plant houses more than 1.3 million tons of water from the cooling system used in response to the meltdown of three reactors following the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami. The release of this water worries South Korea, China and other Pacific countries.
