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Lawsuit on Bikini Atoll nuclear tests

Revisiting Bikini Atoll nuclear tests  Japan Times, 15 May 16 A recent lawsuit filed by former crew members and relatives of deceased crew members of fishing boats operating near the area where the United States conducted a series of nuclear weapons tests in the Pacific in 1954 — seeking compensation from the Japanese government over its questionable behavior at the time and in subsequent years — carries historical significance. More than six decades after the hydrogen bomb tests at Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands, beginning with a test explosion code-named Castle Bravo on March 1, 1954, the lawsuit will help shed fresh light not only on the scope of radiation exposure for Japanese fishermen but also on whether the Japanese and U.S. governments acted properly to deal with the consequences of the fallout from the tests.

Even before the court proceedings begin, the omission on the part of the Japanese government seems clear — its failure to properly examine and keep track of the potential damage to the fishermen’s health and nondisclosure for decades of the records of their radiation exposure.

In connection with the 15-megaton Castle Bravo test, which was over 1,000 times more powerful than the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima on Aug. 6, 1945, the tragedy of the tuna trawler Fukuryu Maru No. 5, also known as the Lucky Dragon, is widely known. The fallout from the test fell onto the vessel for a few hours, causing its 23 crew members to suffer nausea. By the time they returned to their home port of Yaizu, Shizuoka Prefecture, two weeks later, they had developed serious symptoms of radiation sickness, and the radio operator, Aikichi Kuboyama, died six months later. The Fukuryu Maru incident sowed the seed for civic anti-nuclear movements in Japan.

The islanders suffered a great deal. The H-bomb tests contaminated many areas of the Marshall Islands so badly that they became unlivable. The tests destroyed the culture of the islands and irradiated thousands of people. In the years after the tests, the U.S. told evacuated islanders that it was safe to return. But many returning residents were exposed to contaminated water, air and food due to the false assurance.

The plaintiffs in the lawsuit, the first legal action seeking state compensation over the 1954 H-bomb tests, are former crew members of fishing boats other than the Fukuryu Maru that were operating in the area around the time of the tests and family members of fishermen who have since died. Most of the fishing boats were from Kochi Prefecture……

With the lawsuit, the plaintiffs will try to bring to light the government’s omission, including its failure to conduct follow-up health surveys on the crew members and to pay compensation to those who fell ill due to causes linked to the radiation exposure. Several of the former fishermen died of cancer — although it will be difficult to establish the causal relationship because so much time has passed. At least the court proceedings should shed light on how the government acted when it negotiated the settlement with the U.S. over the Fukuryu Maru incident — as well as on why the records of the radiation exposure suffered by other Japanese fishermen were kept undisclosed for so long and why no follow-up checks on the fishermen’s health were made. http://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2016/05/15/editorials/revisiting-bikini-atoll-nuclear-tests/#.VzjsOTV97Gg

May 16, 2016 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | Japan, Legal, OCEANIA