The Pacific island country of Micronesia, one of the fiercest critics of a Japanese decision to release water from the destroyed Fukushima nuclear plant into the sea, said on Friday it was no longer concerned about the plan.
More than 1 million tonnes of water used to cool reactors in the aftermath of the disaster, enough to fill about 500 Olympic-sized swimming pools, is being stored in huge tanks at the plant.
Panuelo's change of stance clears a major obstacle to a plan that has met fierce resistance from Japanese fisherman and sparked similar protests from neighbouring countries including China, South Korea and other Pacific islands. Japan has said regulators have deemed it safe to release the water, which will be filtered to remove most isotopes although it will still contain traces of tritium, an isotope of hydrogen hard to separate from water.urged Japan to delay the releasePanuelo told reporters that the Pacific Island Forum would maintain consultations with Japan on the issue and that Micronesia's change in stance had come after "very, very thorough consultations" with Tokyo.
China's foreign minister raised the issue of the water release with his Japanese counterpart in talks on Thursday, according to a summary of a call between them published by China. "China and the international community are seriously concerned about Japan's unilateral decision to discharge nuclear-polluted water into the sea, and hope that Japan will effectively handle it in an open, transparent, scientific and safe manner," China said.Reporting by John Geddie and Sakura Murakami; Editing by Robert Birsel and
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