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Nuclear protest storm reaches Chennai, India
October 29, 2012
The anti-nuke storm hit Chennai on Monday, with more than 10,000 people opposed to the Kudankulam atomic power project gathering for a siege of the Fort St George on the Marina seafront, home to the secretariat.
The protest was called by political parties and outfits who have joined hands with the People’s Movement Against Nuclear Energy (PMANE), demanding the closure of the Kudankulam plant and withdrawal of cases against activist S.P. Udayakumar and others. They are also seeking the revocation of prohibitory orders clamped around the nuclear site.
Despite a security blanket that had been thrown in and around the city, volunteers and cadres of MDMK, VCK and various other outfits had managed to sneak in large numbers since Sunday night.
The leaders addressed the rally before proceeding to lay a siege which was foiled by the police. Before being taken in a police van, Vaiko charged the central and state governments with ignoring the genuine safety concerns of the coastal communities in southern Tamil Nadu.
This is the second time that anti-nuke protesters have put on a show of strength in the city. The police detained about 3,000 people who were released in the evening.
Solidarity Report: Survivors of Hiroshima go to Israel to advocate “Nuclear Abolition”
September 10, 2012
A group of survivors from the Hiroshima atomic bomb attack have held a protest in Jerusalem calling for the end of nuclear weapons.
The group visited Jerusalem holy sites on Monday and held signs reading “Nuclear Abolition” in Japanese.
The visit comes amid growing tensions between Israel and Iran over the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program. Israel and much of the West believe Iran is seeking nuclear weapons, a charge that Tehran denies.
In 1945, the United States dropped an atomic bomb on the city of Hiroshima, leading to Japan’s surrender and the end of World War II. The blast destroyed most of the city and killed as many as 140,000 people.
Sixty-nine-year-old Hiroshima survivor Nagayama Iwao says “any use of the atom should be forbidden, even for intimidation.”
Hiroshima marks 67th anniversary of bombing, issues plea of nuclear disarmament
August 6, 2012
Hiroshima marked the 67th anniversary of its atomic bombing on Aug. 6 under the shadow of the Fukushima nuclear disaster and by issuing a plea for complete nuclear disarmament.
In a ceremony held at the Peace Memorial Park in the city’s Naka Ward, Hiroshima Mayor Kazumi Matsui read the city’s annual Peace Declaration urging the world to abolish nuclear weapons.
The declaration also took note of the disaster at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant last year by calling on the government to draw up energy policies that protect the lives and safety of citizens.
But it did not go so far as demanding the government to phase out the nation’s dependence on nuclear power generation.
The ceremony started at 8 a.m. About 50,000 people attended the ceremony, according to the Hiroshima municipal government.
Among the many dignitaries were representatives from 71 countries, eight of which sent their representatives for the first time. The participants included British Ambassador David Warren and French Ambassador Christian Masset.
Britain and France are two of the established nuclear powers.
Tamotsu Baba, mayor of Namie, Fukushima Prefecture, came to share experiences on two areas of Japan that have suffered greatly from the nuclear age.
Matsui and two representatives from bereaved families added name lists of 5,729 atomic bomb survivors, or hibakusha, who died over the past year, to the cenotaph that honors victims of the Aug. 6, 1945, bombing.
Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda and foreign dignitaries laid wreaths at the cenotaph one after another.
The Peace Bell was rung at 8:15 a.m. to mark the moment the bomb was dropped, and all participants observed a moment of silence.
In the Peace Declaration, Matsui included experiences of three hibakusha who were selected from the public via an open application system in which they submitted written accounts of their experiences of atomic bombing.
One was an 83-year-old woman who lost six of her seven family members in the bombing. Another was an 80-year-old man who helped collect the dead. The other, an 87-year-old woman, walked in despair along streetcar tracks in the devastated city.
Through their experiences, Matsui drove home the horror of the bombing.
However, he did not call on the government to commit itself to making Japan a nuclear-free country.
Instead, he tried to bridge the tragedy of people affected by the Great East Japan Earthquake and the Fukushima nuclear crisis with Hiroshima citizens of 67 years ago by saying, “Our hearts (of Hiroshima citizens) are with you.”
Matsui called on the government to broaden areas where radioactive “black rain” is believed to have fallen after the atomic bombing so that survivors not in the designated areas can receive medical assistance.
Afterward, Ryuki Miho, 11, a sixth-grader of Hijiyama Elementary School, and Mayu Endo, 12, a sixth-grader of Yasukita Elementary School, read a pledge for peace on behalf of children.
In his speech, the prime minister said: “The government has a basic policy of making Japan free from dependence on nuclear power generation. It will aim to establish energy policies that can put the people at ease in middle to long-term.”
As of the end of March this year, 210,830 people in Japan were registered as hibakusha. The figure was down 8,580 from the same time last year. Their average age was 78.1, up 0.66 year from 2011.
The anti-nuclear movement spread rapidly across Japan after the reactor meltdowns last year at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.
Citizens even rallied around the venue of the ceremony to express anti-nuclear slogans and their opposition to the restart of reactors at the Oi nuclear power plant in Fukui Prefecture.
Japanese protest invasion of US planes
July 23, 2012
The US military’s Osprey aircraft have arrived in Japan despite public protests against their deployment after recent crashes raised safety concerns.
Protesters in a dozen small boats shouted slogans as the shipment of MV-22s were unloaded from a cargo ship at the US Marines’ base in the western city of Iwakuni.
The aircraft will ultimately be sent to Futenma airbase in Okinawa where a separate protest was also held today.
Residents and regional officials have voiced safety concerns following two crashes involving Osprey aircraft this year including one in Morocco in which two Marines were killed.
The June 13 crash, which left five U.S. Air Force personnel injured, followed another accident in Morocco in April that killed two U.S. Marines, and also came just a day after the Japanese government had stressed the safety of the aircraft to Okinawa prefectural officials based on a U.S. military report.
“This confirms that Ospreys could crash at any time,” said Toshio Takahashi, secretary-general of the anti-U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma group Futenma Bakuon Soshodan (Futenma noise legal action group), which organized a sit-in in protest. “We just can’t recognize the deployment (of Ospreys to Okinawa),” he added.
(Source: thepeoplesrecord.com)
More than a third of Fukushima children at risk of developing cancer
July 20, 2012
Over a third of children in Japan’s Fukushima region could be prone to cancer if medics don’t apply more effort in treating their unusually overgrown thyroid glands and commit to international health aid and consultations, according to a new report.
The shocking new report shows that nearly 36 per cent of children in the nuclear disaster-affected Fukushima Prefecture have abnormal thyroid growths. This is an extremely large number of abnormalities – some of which, experts say, pose a risk of becoming cancerous.
After examining more than 38,000 children from the area, medics found that more than 13,000 have cysts or nodules as large as 5 millimeters on their thyroids, the Sixth Report of Fukushima Prefecture Health Management Survey states.
In comparison, a 2001 analysis by the Japan Thyroid Association found that fully zero per cent of children in the city of Nagasaki, which suffered a nuclear attack in August of 1945, had nodules, and only 0.8 per cent had cysts on their thyroids, reports the Telegraph.
Radiation enters the body and is distributed through soft tissue, especially in muscle, and then accumulates in the thyroid. It is this accumulation that can potentially lead to cancer.
“Yes, 35.8 per cent of children in the study have lumps or cysts, but this is not the same as cancer,”says Naomi Takagi, an associate professor at Fukushima University Medical School Hospital, which administered the tests.
“This is an early test, and we will only see the effects of radiation exposure after four or five years”she added.
But some doctors are outraged that the results are not being sufficiently publicized.
“The data should be made available. And they should be consulting with international experts ASAP. And the lesions on the ultrasounds should all be biopsied, and they’re not being biopsied. And if they’re not being biopsied, then that’s ultimately medical irresponsibility. Because if some of these children have cancer and they’re not treated, they’re going to die,“ says pediatrician Helen Caldecott, as cited by Business Insider.
Note: This horrifying news comes during an incredible time of mass protest in Japan as thousands have taken the streets to oppose opening new nuclear reactors. For more information on the current protests going on in Japan against nuclear energy, click here.
Anonymous hackers pick up litter in Tokyo protest
July 8, 2012
Allies of global hacker group Anonymous have put on their masks and picked up litter in a Tokyo park as a protest against tough illegal download laws.
The 80-strong collective said yesterday’s protest was against Japan’s tougher laws against illegal downloads.
In light rain, they took part in an “anonymous cleaning service” for one hour in a park and on pavements in the shopping and entertainment hub of Shibuya, a change from the group’s trademark website attacks.
They were dressed in black and wore masks of Guy Fawkes, the central figure in England’s 1605 Gunpowder Plot to blow up parliament, which have become a symbol of protests by the loosely linked alliance around the world.
Last month, Japan’s parliament enacted new copyright laws that could mean jail for anyone illegally downloading copyrighted music and movies.
On June 26, websites of the Japanese finance ministry, the Supreme Court and other public offices were defaced or brought down after an Anonymous online statement denounced the new laws.
The statement claimed Japan’s recording industry and other content providers were now pushing internet service providers to implement surveillance technology that will spy on every single Internet user in Japan.
The group, which assembled for the clean-up service in Tokyo, attributed the cyber attacks to other Anonymous elements around the world.
“We prefer constructive and productive solutions,” the group said in a statement. “We want to make our fellow citizens aware of the problem with a productive message.”
While The People’s Record was in Chicago for Socialism2012, a “No more Fukushimas” rally in Tokyo drew 200,000+ into the streets.
July 04, 2012
On Friday, June 29, more than two hundred thousand people inundated the streets around the Prime Minister’s office and residence, the Parliament building and other facilities.
Around 5:40 PM, the “protest on the sidewalk” spilled into the streets. Around 6:50 PM, all the six traffic lanes of the street from the crossing in front of the Prime Minister’s Office through the Ministry of Finance were completely occupied by workers and people, young and old, who held makeshift placards. Other streets nearby were also full of protesters. It was a Tahrir Squar in Tokyo.
The huge crowd of people began to move toward the PM’s Office, chanting “Saikado hantai” (“Stop Restart”). The panic-stricken police moved dozens of armored police vehicles and built a wall with them and stopped the march of protesters at the last minute.
Prior to this action the women from Fukushima and the rest of Japan held a rally inside the Upper House Building and in front of the main gate of the Parliament. Around 5:45 PM, they joined the protest in front of the PM’s Office and led chants and speeches. NAZEN contingents also led chants.
The delegation of Ethecon from Germany emphasized, “We have to strengthen solidarity and unity in Europe, America, Asia, Africa and Australia in order to abolish nuclear plants.” The protesters cheered and chanted loud with them.
A historical upsurge of tens of millions of workers and people has begun.
We have to organize an anti-nuke movement in labor unions and workplaces, passing resolutions and begin mobilizing as many workers as possible to get to the Yoyogi Park rally on July 16.
Anti-nuclear protesters gather around the prime minister’s official residence in Tokyo, Friday.
Thousands protest Japan’s return to atomic energy
June 24, 2012
Around 20,000 people gathered in Tokyo to protest the Japanese government’s unilateral decision to restart two nuclear reactors. Many in Japan are wary of nuclear power, as memories of last year’s devastating Fukushima disaster as still fresh.
Slogans chanted by protesters included “No to the restart!”, while posters brandished “No nukes”. The rally, organized in front of the prime minister’s residence, was attended by a number of public figures, including Nobel-prize winning author Kenzaburo Oe, investigative journalist Satoshi Kamata and electronic music pioneer Ryuichi Sakamoto of Yellow Magic Orchestra fame.
Activists promised to hold another anti-nuclear rally next week.
Opposition to the government’s decision to restart the reactors just a month after the country’s last nuclear power plants were shut down has been on the rise. Activists managed to gather some 7.5 million signatures through an online petition.
Last week, Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda gave the go-ahead to restart two nuclear reactors at the Oi plant in western Japan. The decision was taken in conjunction with local authorities, though Noda fell short on his promise to not act without public backing.
June 16, 2012
Hundreds in Japan protest nuclear restart.
Thai activists hold placards during a protest rally against Japanese decision to restart two reactors at Ohi nuclear power plant, in front of the Japanese Embassy in Bangkok, capital of Thailand, on June 15, 2012. Japan moved closer Thursday to restart nuclear reactors for the first time since last year’s earthquake and tsunami led to a nationwide shutdown after the governor of Fukui, the prefecture in which Ohi is located, gave his support to a plan to bring two of them back.
Japanese protest over planned restart of nuclear reactors
Hundreds of Japanese anti-nuclear protesters gathered outside the prime minister’s office on Friday, beating drums and chanting slogans against the planned restart of reactors a year after the world’s worst nuclear disaster in 25 years.
“We oppose restarts,” the crowd of about 1,000, which stretched for around 200 meters down the block, shouted in the peaceful demonstration.
Public mistrust of nuclear power has grown since the earthquake and tsunami on March 11 last year triggered the worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl.
Greenpeace activists and local people greet the Japanese Economy, Trade and Industry Minister Yukio Edano outside the Fukui Prefecture Government offices with sings and banners reading: “EDA NO” (no nuclear). The activists are protesting against the Government’s push to bring two reactors at the Oi Nuclear Power Plant back online - against public opinion and the recommendations of numerous experts.
