The plaintiffs are demanding the revocation of safety permits granted by the Nuclear Regulation Authority for the wastewater’s release and a halt to the discharge, lawyer Kenjiro Kitamura said.
The government and TEPCO say the treated water meets legally releasable levels and is further diluted by hundreds of times with seawater before being released into the sea.
The International Atomic Energy Agency, which reviewed the release plan at Japan’s request, concluded that the release’s impact on the environment, marine life and humans will be negligible.
“The intentional release to the sea is an intentional harmful act that adds to the (nuclear plant) accident,” said another lawyer, Hiroyuki Kawai. He said the ocean is a public resource and it is unethical for a company to discharge wastewater into it.
TEPCO said it could not comment until it receives a copy of the lawsuit.
China banned all imports of Japanese seafood in response to the release, while Hong Kong and Macao suspended imports from 10 prefectures including Fukushima. Groups in South Korea have also condemned the discharge.
China is the biggest importer of Japanese seafood, and its ban has hit the industry hard.
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s Cabinet on Tuesday approved a ¥20.7 billion (US$141 million) emergency fund to help exporters hurt by the Chinese ban.
The fund is in addition to ¥80 billion (US$547 million) that the government previously allocated to support fisheries and seafood processing and combat reputational damage to Japanese products.
Kishida said while attending a summit of Southeast Asian leaders in Indonesia that China’s ban contrasts sharply with a broad understanding of the release shown by many other countries.
Source: CNA
