Approval for Tokai nuclear reprocessing plant BEFORE safety screening!
NRA to approve restart of reprocessing facility http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/english/news/20131211_29.html Japan’s nuclear regulator plans to approve a partial restart of a facility for reprocessing spent nuclear fuel before it clears safety screening under new regulations.
The Nuclear Regulation Authority says it’s allowing the restart to make plutonium and other highly radioactive waste in the facility solid and more stable.
The authority said on Wednesday that it plans to allow the government-backed Japan Atomic Energy Agency to operate part of the plant in Tokai Village, about 100 kilometers north of Tokyo.
The decision comes after the agency sought permission to restart the facility soon, saying that keeping the waste in liquid form involves high risks.
NRA commissioners said the facility’s stockpiles of plutonium solutions and other liquid waste will be made safer when reprocessed into solids.
They came up with a plan to allow part of the facility to run for 5 years before checking is done under the enhanced regulations.
The facility stores 3.5 cubic meters of solutions containing plutonium and more than 400 cubic meters of highly radioactive liquid waste. NRA secretariat officials say reprocessing the plutonium solutions into powder will take about 2 years, and turning other liquid waste into glass 21 years.
The new regulations are to take effect on December 18th. The NRA is to give formal approval after confirming that the agency can ensure stable reprocessing at the plant.
Japan’s nuclear regime slides towards fascism
Japan’s New ‘Fukushima Fascism’ Eco Watch, 12 Dec 13, Harvey Wasserman Fukushima continues to spew out radiation. The quantities seem to be rising, as do the impacts.
The site has been infiltrated by organized crime. There are horrifying signs of ecological disaster in the Pacific and human health impacts in the U.S.
But within Japan, a new State Secrets Act makes such talk punishable by up to ten years in prison.
Taro Yamamoto, a Japanese legislator, says the law “represents a coup d’etat” leading to “the recreation of a fascist state.” The powerful Asahi Shimbun newspaper compares it to “conspiracy” laws passed by totalitarian Japan in the lead-up to Pearl Harbor, and warns it could end independent reporting on Fukushima.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has been leading Japan in an increasingly militaristic direction. Tensions have increased with China. Massive demonstrations have been renounced with talk of “treason.”
But it’s Fukushima that hangs most heavily over the nation and the world.
Tokyo Electric Power has begun the bring-down of hot fuel rods suspended high in the air over the heavily damaged Unit Four. The first assemblies it removed may have contained unused rods. The second may have been extremely radioactive.
But Tepco has clamped down on media coverage and complains about news helicopters filming the fuel rod removal.
Under the new State Secrets Act, the government could ban—and arrest—all independent media under any conditions at Fukushima, throwing a shroud of darkness over a disaster that threatens us all.
By all accounts, whatever clean-up is possible will span decades. The town of Fairfax, CA, has now called for a global takeover at Fukushima. More than 150,000 signees have asked the UN for such intervention.
As a private corporation, Tepco is geared to cut corners, slash wages and turn the clean-up into a private profit center.
It will have ample opportunity. The fuel pool at Unit Four poses huge dangers that could take years to sort out. But so do the ones at Units One, Two and Three. The site overall is littered with thousands of intensely radioactive rods and other materials whose potential fallout is thousands of times greater than what hit Hiroshima in 1945.
Soon after the accident, Tepco slashed the Fukushima workforce. It has since restored some of it, but has cut wages. Shady contractors 
shuttle in hundreds of untrained laborers to work in horrific conditions. Reuters says the site is heaving infiltrated by organized crime, raising the specter of stolen radioactive materials for dirty bombs and more.
Thousands of tons of radioactive water now sit in leaky tanks built by temporary workers who warn of their shoddy construction. They are sure to collapse with a strong earthquake.
Tepco says it may just dump the excess water into the Pacific anyway. Nuclear expert Arjun Makhijani has advocated the water be stored in supertankers until it can be treated, but the suggestion 
has been ignored.
Hundreds of tons of water also flow daily from the mountains through the contaminated site and into the Pacific. Nuclear engineer Arnie Gundersen long ago asked Tepco to dig a trench filled with absorbents to divert that flow. But he was told that would cost too much money.
Now Tepco wants to install a wall of ice. But that can’t be built for at least two years. It’s unclear where the energy to keep the wall frozen will come from, or if it would work at all.
Meanwhile, radiation is now reaching record levels in both the air and water.
The fallout has been already been detected off the coast of Alaska. It will cycle down along the west coast of Canada and the U.S. to northern Mexico by the end of 2014. Massive disappearances of sea lion pups, sardines, salmon, killer whales and other marine life are being reported, along with a terrifying mass disintegration of star fish. One sailor has documented a massive “dead zone” out 2,000 miles from Fukushima. Impacts on humans have already been documented in California and elsewhere.
Without global intervention, long-lived isotopes from Fukushima will continue to pour into the biosphere for decades to come.
The only power now being produced at Fukushima comes from a massive new windmill just recently installed offshore.
Amidst a disaster it can’t handle, the Japanese government is still pushing to re-open the 50 reactors forced shut since the melt-downs. It wants to avoid public fallout amidst a terrified population, and on the 2020 Olympics, scheduled for a Tokyo region now laced with radioactive hot spots. At least one on-site camera has stopped functioning. The government has also apparently stopped helicopter-based radiation monitoring.
A year ago a Japanese professor was detained 20 days without trial for speaking out against the open-air incineration of radioactive waste.
Now Prime Minister Abe can do far worse. The Times of India reports that the State Secrets Act is unpopular, and that Abe’s approval ratings have dropped with its passage.
But the new law may make Japan’s democracy a relic of its pre-Fukushima past.
It’s the cancerous mark of a nuclear regime bound to control all knowledge of a lethal global catastrophe now ceaselessly escalating.
Visit EcoWatch’s NUCLEAR page for more related news on this topic.
Japan’s expensive problem – 132,738 tonnes of radioactive soil
Japan to spend $970 mn on nuclear soil store Phys Org News 12 Dec 13 Japan is planning to earmark 100 billion yen ($970 million) for a storage facility for tens of thousands of tonnes of soil contaminated with radiation from the Fukushima disaster, a report said Wednesday.
The government will set aside the cash to buy some 3 to 5 square kilometres (1.2 to 2 square miles) of land somewhere near the crippled plant, the Asahi Shimbun reported.
But finding a candidate site for the facility, which the government envisages using for 30 years, is a political challenge as no local authority has so far raised its hand.
Tokyo would like to use land in three heavily contaminated towns near the plant, said the paper, adding environment minister Nobuteru Ishiara will speak with local officials this weekend.
The mayors of the towns—Futaba, Okuma and Naraha—along with the governor of Fukushima prefecture Yuhei Sato, are believed to be concerned that the temporary site could easily become permanent………No one from the environment ministry was available for comment on the report.
As of the end of August, the total amount of contaminated soil and debris collected through decontamination efforts, in which the top layer of soil is stripped from the land, stood at 132,738 tonnes, about 80 percent of which is from Fukushima prefecture.
This contaminated waste is currently stored at waste incineration plants, sewage treatment plants and agricultural and forestry facilities nationwide.
Experts say a more long-term solution needs to be found because storage capacity at these facilities is reaching its limits. http://phys.org/news/2013-12-japan-mn-nuclear-soil.html#jCp
Japan’s state secrets law criminalises investigative journalism
Japan enacts state secrets law late Friday night amid revolt — “It criminalizes investigative journalism” — Terrorism defined as “imposing one’s opinions on others”http://enenews.com/secrets-law-passes-late-friday-night-amid-revolt-mushrooming-opposition-it-criminalizes-investigative-journalism-terrorism-defined-as-imposing-ones-opinions-on-others-protesto
Japan Times, , Dec. 6, 2013: Following political turmoil that rocked the Diet over the past week, ruling block Upper House members finally enacted the contentious state secrets bill late Friday night. Earlier in the day, opposition parties intensified their protests in vain over a law that’s being criticizing for not creating an independent oversight body capable of preventing the government from hiding inconvenient information at its discretion.
Businessweek, Dec. 6, 2013: Prime Minister Shinzo Abe secured final passage of a bill granting Japan’s government sweeping powers to declare state secrets, a measure aimed at shoring up defense ties with the U.S. that prompted a public backlash and revolt by the opposition.
Asahi Shimbun, , Dec. 6, 2013: Kazuo Shii, chief of the Japanese Communist Party, described the ruling coalition’s behavior as “tyrannical, arrogant and disorderly.” The ruling coalition believed prolonging the Diet debate any longer could backfire, only fueling the mushrooming opposition to the bill, and lead to a further decline in approval ratings for Abe’s Cabinet and hold on power. An Asahi Shimbun survey taken between Nov. 30-Dec. 1 showed the Cabinet’s approval rating at 49 percent, dipping below 50 percent for the first time since he took power in December 2012. Officials in the Abe administration foresee the public eventually forgetting about the controversy, once the legislation is approved.
GlobalPost,, Dec. 6, 2013: Here are four disturbing ways the bill could be a democracy muzzler. It defines terrorism as imposing one’s opinions on others […] According to Article 12, terrorism is partially defined as an activity that forces “political and other principles or opinions on the state or other people.” In other words, throw up a rowdy anti-government protest, and the judiciary can find a reason to lock you away. It criminalizes investigative journalism […] Journalists can be prosecuted for “improperly accessing” classified documents or “conspiring” to leak them. Even asking an official to take a look at classified documents could constitute “conspiracy,” leading to up to five years in prison. “Instigating” the release of government secrets, meanwhile, carries up to 10 years in the dock. […] Basically, anything can be a secret […] administrators can make the opaque decisions to classify a document even if their work hardly relates to national security. That effectively allows them to hide any embarrassing piece of evidence, and then pursue the journalists and bloggers who make it public. […]
Fukushima’s record perilous radiation
Record outdoor radiation level that ‘can kill in 20 min’ detected at Fukushima Rt.com,8 Dec 13,Outdoor radiation levels have reached their highest at Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant,warns the operator company.Radiation found in an area near a steel pipe that connects reactor buildings could kill an exposed person in 20 minutes,local media reported.The plant’s operator and the utility responsible for the clean-up Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) detected record radiation levels on a duct which connects reactor buildings and the 120 meter tall ventilation pipe located outside on Friday. TEPCO measured radiation at eight locations around the pipe with the highest estimated at two locations – 25 Sieverts per hour and about 15 Sieverts per hour, the company said.
The ventilation pipe used to conduct radioactive gasses after the nuclear disaster may still contain radioactive substances, TEPCO added. ……http://rt.com/news/fukushima-radiation-record-outdoor-912/
Plan for Fukushima nuclear plant to get UK style decommissioning agency
Japan may set up UK-style decommission agency for Fukushima plant BY YOSHIFUMI TAKEMOTO TOKYO Thu Dec 5, 2013 (Reuters) – Japan’s ruling party could set up a British-style agency to shut down the wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant, taking control of a project now managed by the station’s embattled operator, a senior party policymaker said on Thursday…… Tepco, de facto nationalized after 2011, is still responsible for the ambitious decommissioning of the plant as well as for paying compensation to evacuees and cleaning up affected areas.
A plan to set up a decommissioning agency is controversial as it would reduce Tepco’s responsibility and increase the burden on taxpayers.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has so far pledged half a billion dollars in government funds to help stem the flow of contaminated water at the plant after a highly radioactive water leak in August triggered international alarm………http://in.reuters.com/article/2013/12/05/us-japan-fukushima-ldp-idINBRE9B407C20131205
UK Olympic sized nuclear cover up – and it has spread to Japan
OP – ED Arclight2011 Nuclear-news.net 8 December 2013
The UK has decided to take the cheapest option for decommissioning according to a recent report by the badly named Department of the Environment and Climate Change (DECC), as 65 percent of their annual budget goes just on the costs of decommissioning it should be named British Nuclear Fools.
The processes involved with “decommissioning” are a “corporate secret” but a quick google says that the cheapest option is dissolution that involves melting everything in Nitric acid (or similar) and this has been the cause of high NO2 levels in the UK that are regularly blamed on other industries or countries. Though La Hague in France does contribute.
The UK has been reprimanded by the EU for the deaths caused by this NO2. And in the UK parliament we hear calls to cut the pollution detection monitors as they give the nuclear hazard away and threaten profits. These NO gases and particulates make it to even the arctic region of Russia (as Bellona has reported on many occasion whilst defending Norway from unjust blame)
As EDF and the French government begin the plans to reduce French nuclear and the shutting down of La Hague, they plan to increase use of Sellafield and other sites in the UK for these environmentally polluting nuclear processes.
The Irish Government has not been involved in the decisions for Hinckley, so An Taisce has formally lodged an appeal to the EU. The reaction of the UK and Ed Davey are well documented here… https://nuclear-news.net/2013/12/06/no-objection-by-ireland-uk-nuclear-hearing-told/
And as DECC were threatened with non co-operation if they asked for certain technical details or even the names of people involved, the Irish were likely not to be aware of the processes that the UK was planning to expand nor has their been a proper discussion concerning radionuclide’s and air quality issues being released due to these nuclear processes.
In fact not even the British public could be expected to know. In fact the UK NGO steering group who was supposed to be discussing this very issue over the past two years were not even allowed to know.
Who needs Leveson inquiry to silence information when the corporations and governments are doing the job so well anyway, I find myself asking.
I might point out that DECC also masterminded the Science Media Centre UK (SMC) to cover up or “manage” the Fukushima incident press coverage in 2011, which they then did and were rewarded by their sponsors (The big corporations and nuclear interests).
Bloggers and free press elements in Japan got too much truth out and the Japanese nuclear family had to close ranks with the USA and the Olympic Committee and have came up with the new “Secrets Act” , a shocking attack on free speech from a supposedly western country. It is now up to the Japanese Press to mobilize the people to reject this new Law, there are some signs of dissent in the media. We wish them well!
DECC has contracts of understanding with ROSATOM as well as some dubious eastern nuclear states. China, an authoritarian and pushy country will have the same leverage over DECC as the French and USA partners and therefore the Chinese communist (mostly)will have control of the information we hear on the news etc.. Have you heard the one about the Dalai lama recently? No? And you probably never will again!
Elements of the UK Media have had enough and are beginning to look a little harder at the Pro nuclear spin and analyse the sources of this drive for nuclear. The UK media is beginning to wake up to the deception but how deep will they dig?
It began after the crash of 2008 and 200 billion Euro moved directly into nuclear investments (A Norwegian insurance investment company has just sold its stocks in TEPCO at a massiviely reduced price and has beeen left licking its wounds). The Insurance and banking industry saw this as a safe bet for three more years and are heavily invested, in fact, the UK insurance industry will be proping up this PONZI scheme with a staggering 25 billion investment that is a curiously small amount considering the Total investment accrued in the Nuclear Industry by now. Just the normal monthly “Top Up” perhaps?
And if you dont think the Insurance Corporations view this as their own private nuclear “gravy train” why was the liability capped in Canada to only 1 billion? when the Japanese have paid TEPCO 50 billion in just the first year after the disaster. It seems it is the beleaguered Tax Payer is always the end recipient of this PONZI shaped dept burden.
Finally, the UK corporations have been supporting the Pro nuclear Corporations in Japan from the start and are still supporting Japan as it becomes a fascist state to protect their investments. These investments are very long term, measured in decades, and any country with nuclear power could be facing the same control of the population and of information.
Orwell would be not surprised perhaps at technology being used to enslave people by reducing their knowledge and controlling them totally.. No dissent, no illegal thoughts or 5 years in prison and a criminal history to stop you getting work for the rest of your life. Poor Japan! Poor UK!
Right after the Fukushima disaster, Japan set about to market nuclear power
Japan “will resuscitate nuclear energy, and rebuild the basis for promoting exports of infrastructure facilities,” indicating that the ministry would continue to advance nuclear power generation and further expand nuclear facilities exports.
Because the pro-nuclear Abe administration has said, “We will share our experience of the accident and lessons learned from the disaster with countries of the world,” the ministry’s report can be regarded as a prototype for Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s nuclear policy.
Ministry continued promoting nuclear power right after Fukushima accident December 02, 2013 THE ASAHI SHIMBUN The industry ministry began working to continue promoting nuclear power even immediately following the disastrous meltdowns at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant in March 2011, sources said.
The Asahi Shimbun has obtained a copy of the ministry’s confidential internal document titled, “Toward the Renaissance of Nuclear Energy,” which was compiled in late March 2011.
The report was written by a senior ministry official familiar with nuclear power facilities and distributed to its executives involved in designing the country’s energy policy, according to the sources.
The in-house document was used as a basis to determine the nation’s future nuclear policy in the aftermath of the disaster triggered by the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami on March 11, 2011, the sources said. Continue reading
Japan marketing nuclear technology to India
Nuclear deal with Japan on the anvil THE HNDU, SANDEEP DIKSHIT , 2 Dec 13 At meeting with Emperor, Manmohan prefers to focus on economic aspects of relationship
Japan has said the main purpose of Emperor Akihito’s ongoing visit to India was to add more ballast to the bilateral relationship.
One of the elements that would add greater depth to the ties would be a civil nuclear agreement. “We are close to a bilateral deal on the peaceful use of nuclear energy,’’ said senior Japanese diplomats accompanying the Emperor, who is on a six-day visit to India……http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/nuclear-deal-with-japan-on-the-anvil/article5415157.ece
Leaking acid causes stop-work at Fukushima clean-up
Fukushima nuclear reactor clean-up unit hit by acid leak http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/fukushima-nuclear-reactor-cleanup-unit-hit-by-acid-leak/story-e6frg6so-1226772520045 STAFF WRITERS AFP DECEMBER 02, 2013 THE trouble-prone system used to decontaminate radioactive water at Japan’s crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant was switched off yesterday because of a chemical leak, the plant’s operator said.
Hydrochloric acid, used to neutralise the alkaline water being decontaminated, was found seeping from a pipe joint, the Tokyo Electric Power Co said.
The joint was wrapped in a vinyl bag to contain the leakage, TEPCO said, and the company was investigating the cause. About a litre of hydrochloric acid had been contained in the bag. The leak was found at one of three Advanced Liquid Processing System units designed to remove radioactivity from contaminated water at the plant, where a massive earthquake and tsunami in March 2011 sent the nuclear reactors into meltdown.
The systems are expected to play a crucial role in treating the huge amounts of toxic water accumulating at the plant. The troubled system was one of two units that had been in trial operation and were due to go into full operation yesterday.
In late September, plastic padding clogged up a drain in the same system, causing it to shut down. In October, it was halted due to a programming mistake.
Thousands of tonnes of water, used since the meltdown to cool reactors or polluted by other radioactive material, are being stored in huge tanks at the site on Japan’s northeast coast.
Tokyo court accepts withdrawal of libel suit against journalist
NUCLEAR INDUSTRY BUSINESSMAN WITHDRAWS LIBEL SUIT AGAINST FREELANCER HTTPS://EN.RSF.ORG/JAPAN-NUCLEAR-INDUSTRY-BUSINESSMAN-16-08-2013,45056.HTML 16 AUGUST 2013. Reporters Without Borders welcomes the decision by Shiro Shirakawa, the head of the nuclear security systems company New Tech, to withdraw a libel suit against freelance journalist Minoru Tanaka. A Tokyo court has accepted the withdrawal, announced on 12 August.
“This libel suit was an attempt by an influential member of Japan’s nuclear industrial complex, known as the ‘nuclear village,’ to harass and intimidate Tanaka into silence and self-censorship,” Reporters Without Borders said. “We are pleased that it did not work but we continue to be concerned for other journalists who try to cover the sensitive issue of Japan’s nuclear industry. There are still too many cases of reporters being pressured or censored when they try to provide information about the Fukushima disaster and its aftermath.
“The damages award Tanaka was facing if found guilty of libelling Shirakawa was clearly out of all proportion. We urge the courts to reject such ‘gag suits’ or ‘SLAPPs’ if they continue to be filed, and to propose proportionate alternatives such as the publication of a response.”
Shirakawa sued Tanaka, 52, over a December 2011 article for the weekly Shukan Kinyobiheadlined “The last big fixer, Shiro Shirakawa, gets his share of the TEPCO nuclear cake” – TEPCO being the owner of the Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear plant that suffered meltdowns after a tsunami in March 2011.
Using information in the public domain, the article accused Shirakawa of making a lot of money by acting as an intermediary between TEPCO, construction companies, politicians such as the leading parliamentarian Kamei Shizuka, and even clandestine organizations.
Ever since the Fukushima-Daiichi disaster, freelance journalists who cover the nuclear industry have had their access to information restricted and have, for example, been prevented from covering anti-nuclear demonstrations. Reporters Without Borders issued several press releases condemning the judicial harassment of Tanaka, who was sued for 67 million yen (600,000 euros) in damages.
Scanning of Japanese babies, for internal radiation exposure
Scanner measures radiation in babies http://the-japan-news.com/news/article/0000834507 1 Dec 13, The Yomiuri Shimbun University of Tokyo researchers and radiation measurement equipment maker Canberra Japan have jointly developed a device to measure internal exposure to radiation in babies, following the outbreak of the crisis at Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant in March 2011.
Hirata Central Hospital in Hirata, Fukushima Prefecture, will start to offer free tests using the equipment, dubbed “Baby Scan,” on Monday.
Developers of the device included Ryugo Hayano, 61, a University of Tokyo professor specializing in particle and nuclear physics. The equipment allows babies to be tested for radiation in a lying position, making it the first of its kind in the nation.
Until now, infants’ internal exposure has been measured with equipment for adults, leading to some errors. In addition, as such equipment requires the subject to remain standing for about two minutes, babies in principle cannot take the test.
Radioactive debris spread through Fukushima after typhoons
Typhoons spreading Fukushima fallout ABC News 29 Nov 2013, Typhoons that hit Japan each year are contributing to the spread of radioactive material from the Fukushima nuclear disaster into the country’s waterways, researchers say.
A joint study by France’s Climate and Environmental Science laboratory (LSCE) and Tsukuba University in Japan shows contaminated soil gets washed away by the high winds and rain and deposited in streams and rivers. ”There is a definite dispersal towards the ocean,” LSCE researcher Olivier Evrard said Wednesday.
The typhoons “strongly contribute” to soil dispersal, he said, though it can be months later, after the winter snow melts, that contamination actually passes into rivers……….
Studies have shown that soil erosion can move the radioactive varieties of cesium-134 and 137 from the northern mountains near Fukushima into rivers, and then out into the Pacific Ocean.
Last year, the radioactive content of Japan’s rivers dropped due to fairly moderate typhoons. However, more frequent and fierce storms in 2013 have brought a new flood of caesium particles.
This is “proof that the source of the radioactivity has not diminished upstream” said Mr Evrard. Tsukuba University has completed a number of studies on Fukushima since November 2011. Scientists “concentrated mostly on the direct fallout from Fukushima yet this is another source of radioactive deposits” that must be taken into account, he warned. Coastal areas home to fishermen or where people bathe in particular face a potential risk…….http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-11-29/an-typhoons-spreading-fukushima-fallout/5124084
Women’s and community groups angered at Japan’s new secrecy law
Yuri Horie, [ ed: I have doubts on this name – it might be incorrect] president of the Japan Federation of Women’s Organizations (Fudanren), said, “We must not allow for a repeat of the mistake that lead to the war with women’s eyes, ears and mouths shut off.”
Fukushima residents furious at lower house passage of contentious secrecy bill – Mainichi, 27 Nov 13, FUKUSHIMA — Residents here are angry over the ruling bloc’s railroading of a highly controversial state secrets protection bill through the House of Representatives on the evening of Nov. 26 — just one day after voicing strong opposition to the legislation at a public hearing.
At the lower house special committee’s public hearing on the legislation held in Fukushima on Nov. 25, all of the seven local residents who were invited to state their opinions voiced opposition to or concerns about the government-sponsored secrecy bill. They voiced fear that information related to the Fukushima nuclear disaster could be designated as “special secrets.” Their opinions, however, were not reflected in Diet deliberations. Therefore, they became infuriated at the quick-and-dirty passage of the bill through the lower house. One of the residents angrily said, “How far are they going to go in fooling us?” Continue reading
The road to fascism – Japan’s new secrecy law
Secrecy law approved in Japan — AP: Prison for ‘inappropriate reporting’ — Official: We’re on path to be fascist state — Fear Fukushima cover-ups to worsen http://enenews.com/secrecy-law-approved-by-japan-lawmakers-ap-prison-for-inappropriate-reporting-official-were-on-path-to-be-fascist-state-fear-of-more-fukushima-cover-ups
Associated Press, Nov. 26, 2013: Japan’s more powerful lower house of Parliament approved a state secrecy bill late Tuesday […] Critics say it might sway authorities to withhold more information about nuclear power plants […] The move is welcomed by the United States […] lawyer Hiroyasu Maki said the bill’s definition of secrets is so vague and broad that it could easily be expanded to include radiation data […] Journalists who obtain information “inappropriately” or “wrongfully” can get up to five years in prison, prompting criticism that it would make officials more secretive and intimidate the media. Attempted leaks or inappropriate reporting, complicity or solicitation are also considered illegal. […] Japan’s proposed law also designates the prime minister as a third-party overseer.
BBC, Nov. 26, 2013: Japan approves new state secrecy bill to combat leaks […] The bill now goes to the upper house, where it is also likely to be passed.
The Australian, Nov. 25, 2013: Japanese press baulks at push for ‘fascist’ secrecy laws Continue reading
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