The criticisms formulated in a letter by five former Japanese prime ministers against the inclusion of nuclear energy in the European “green” taxonomy irritate the Japanese government, which is in favor of reviving the atom sector. The current head of government, Fumio Kishida, described Thursday, February 3, the missive of“inappropriate”. On the same day, Masao Uchibori, governor of the department of Fukushima (North-East, scene of the nuclear disaster of March 2011) and close to the authorities, regretted the mention “incorrect” saying that “many children [souffraient] thyroid cancer » because of the disaster.
Dated January 27, the letter addressed to the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, is signed by Morihiro Hosokawa (1993-1994), Tomiichi Murayama (1994-1996), Junichiro Koizumi (2001-2006), Yukio Hatoyama (2009-2010) and Naoto Kan (2010-2011). Recalling the disasters of Three Mile Island, in the United States, in March 1979, of Chernobyl (Ukraine), in April 1986, and of Fukushima – at the origin of the evacuation of many inhabitants, the contamination of agricultural areas and therefore thyroid cancer in children – the signatories note that these tragedies have “proved, and at a high price, that nuclear power was not safe”.
At the Foreign Press Correspondents Club on the same day in Tokyo, Mr. Koizumi added that the Fukushima drama had shown that “ nuclear was not safe, cheap and clean”. “There is enough renewable energy to meet the needs”added Mr. Kan, who recalled the planned evacuation of Tokyo after the accident. “If such a catastrophe occurred in France, Paris would have to be evacuated for fifty, even a hundred years.”
“Ultra-sensitive screening procedures”
The approach of the former prime ministers coincided with the complaint filed against the Tokyo Electricity Company (Tepco, operator of Fukushima Daiichi) by six Fukushima residents. Aged six to sixteen in 2011, they were diagnosed with thyroid cancer between 2012 and 2018.
The survey carried out by the Fukushima department on 380,000 residents under the age of eighteen at the time of the disaster revealed an occurrence rate of thyroid cancer of 77 per 100,000 people, higher than the usual rate of 1 to 2 per million, according to plaintiffs’ attorneys.
In March 2021, the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Ionizing Radiation attributed this high proportion to “ultrasensitive screening procedures, which revealed the prevalence of thyroid abnormalities in the population not previously detected”. An argument taken up by the department of Fukushima.
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