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| Japan to stop pumping radioactive water in sea Posted: 08 Apr 2011 06:39 PM PDT  Kaichiro Saito, CEO of Kakuboshi Co, a sake maker since 1902, checks damages at his sake brewery in Kesennuma, Miyagi prefecture. — Reuters pic "The emptying out of the relatively low radiation water is expected to finish tomorrow," a Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco) official said late yesterday. Tepco is struggling to contain the worst atomic crisis since Chernobyl, with its engineers pumping low-level radioactive seawater, used to cool overheated fuel rods, back into the sea for the past five days due to a lack of storage capacity. Engineers say they are far from in control of the damaged reactors and it could take months to stabilise them and years to clear up the toxic mess left behind. Nuclear reactor maker Toshiba Corp has proposed a 10-year plan to decommission four of the six damaged reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, 240 km north of Tokyo, said Kyodo news agency. But the government has said it was too early to have a "specific road map" for ending the nuclear crisis. The magnitude 9 earthquake and tsunami on March 11 left 28,000 people dead or missing, and north-eastern Japan a splintered wreck. Several countries have restricted food imports from Japan over radiation fears as Japan's economy reels from the country's worst disaster since World War Two. Disruptions to Japanese supply chains are reverberating around the world. China will ban imports of farm produce, including food and feedstuff, from 12 areas in Japan, the official Xinhua news agency said today. It did not identify the 12 areas. China said earlier it had detected 10 cases of ships, aircraft or cargo arriving from Japan with higher than normal levels of radiation since mid-March. Xinhua reported earlier that trace levels of radioactivity had been detected in 22 Chinese provinces. Yesterday, China said it would closely monitor Japan's actions to regain control of the plant and demanded Tokyo provide swift and accurate information on the crisis. South Korea has also criticised Japan, accusing it of incompetence for failing to notify its neighbours that it would pump radioactive water into the sea. Radiation from Japan spread around the entire northern hemisphere in the first two weeks of the nuclear crisis, according to the Vienna-based Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organisation (CTBTO). CTBTO's 30 monitoring stations detected minute levels of radiation in North America after three days, in Europe after 12 days and the entire northern hemisphere after 15 days. Tepco said it was continuing to inject nitrogen into one of the reactors to prevent a repeat of last month's hydrogen explosions, which would release highly radioactive particles. The world's third largest economy is now in a "severe condition", the government said yesterday. Finance leaders of the G20 group of countries will ask Tokyo for a plan to resuscitate its economy as they see the damage from the earthquake as a risk to global growth, Takatoshi Kato, a former IMF deputy managing director, told Reuters yesterday. Automaker Toyota Motor Corp plans to idle some of US plants late in April, while Honda Motor Co Ltd has extended reduced US production until April 22. Power blackouts and restrictions, factory shutdowns, and a sharp drop in tourists have hit the world's most indebted nation, which is facing a damages bill as high as US$300 billion (RM1.02 billion), making it by far the world's costliest natural disaster. Economists expect Japan to slip into recession this year. "Japan's economy is suddenly in a severe condition due to the effects of the earthquake," said the Cabinet Office after releasing a survey of hotel and restaurant staff and taxi drivers, showing a record fall in confidence to levels last seen during the depths of the global financial crisis. In an obvious sign of the downturn, taxis park in long lines in central Tokyo each night, their drivers staying warm by idling the motor as they wait forlornly for a fare. A major aftershock on Thursday forced two companies, including electronics giant Sony Corp , to stop production because of power cuts. On a brighter note, Japan's top automakers Toyota and Nissan Motor Co said they planned to resume production at all domestic factories in stages starting on Monday, although output levels would be at half of original plans. — Reuters Full Feed Generated by Get Full RSS, sponsored by USA Best Price. |
| Rebels repel assault on Misrata, five dead Posted: 08 Apr 2011 05:55 PM PDT  A still image taken from an undated video shows a Libyan tank firing before it is destroyed by a missile fired by a NATO Tornado fighter jet in Libya. — Reuters pic Prospects faded that Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi would be ousted by the armed revolt and NATO leaders acknowledged the limits of their air power, which has caused rather than broken a military stalemate. Alliance officials expressed frustration that Gaddafi's tactics of sheltering his armour in civilian areas had reduced the effects of air supremacy and apologised for a "friendly fire" incident on Thursday in which rebels said five fighters were killed. Misrata, a lone major rebel outpost in the west of the country, has been under siege by Gaddafi's forces for weeks. Yesterday, insurgents said they had pushed back an assault on the eastern flank of the coastal city after fierce street battles. A rebel spokesman said government troops had advanced on the heavily populated Esqeer district in an effort to loosen the rebels' grip on Misrata, where families are crammed together in the few remaining safe districts. "The attack from the east has been repelled now and the (pro-Gaddafi) forces have been pushed back," rebel spokesman Hassan al-Misrati told Reuters by telephone. A Misrata resident called Ghassan told Reuters: "Medics at the hospital told us that five people were killed today and 10 others were wounded. We were at the hospital and we talked to medics." Also speaking by phone, he said he could still hear clashes in the town. "We can still hear mortar fire in the distance". NATO air strikes hit weapons depots belonging to Gaddafi's forces near the town of Zintan yesterday, a resident said. "The depots are situated 15 km southeast of Zintan. We could see buildings on fire in the distance," the resident, called Abdulrahman, said by phone. The only active front in the war, along the Mediterranean coast around the eastern towns of Brega and Ajdabiyah, has descended into a desultory stalemate with both sides making advances and then retreating behind secure lines. Yesterday, rebels at the western boundary of Ajdabiyah, still jittery after the friendly fire accident, fled from an artillery bombardment but there was no sign of a government advance. Ahmed Ignashy, a doctor at Ajdabiyah hospital, said about six rebels were wounded in skirmishes 20 km west. The head of US Africa Command, General Carter Ham, said the conflict was entering stalemate and it was unlikely the rebels would be able to fight their way into Tripoli. Early hopes that air attacks on Gaddafi forces would tip the balance in favour of the rebels had evaporated and Western leaders were emphasising a political solution. NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen took a similar line to Ham yesterday. "There is no military solution only. We need a political solution," he told Al Jazeera television. NATO spokeswoman Oana Lungescu spoke of the difficulties facing alliance pilots because of Gaddafi's tactics. "The fact is they are using human shields and parking tanks next to mosques and schools so it is very hard to pinpoint any military hardware without causing civilian casualties," she said. Political analysts predicted an extended conflict leading towards possible division of the country between east and west. "The opposition forces are insufficient to break this deadlock and so as things stand the march on Tripoli is not going to happen," said John Marks, chairman of Britain's Cross Border Information consultancy. "This standoff looks like it could go on pretty much forever ... for now we have a stalemate so we are looking rather more at a de facto partition." Geoff Porter of North Africa Risk Consulting agreed. "It is increasingly unlikely that the rebels will get anywhere close to Tripoli," he said. The confusion on the desert battlefield has caused friendly fire incidents, increasing anger among the rebels, who said they lost five men on Thursday when NATO planes bombed a column of 20 tanks brought out of storage to bolster the eastern front. It was the second time in less than a week that rebels had blamed NATO for bombing their comrades by mistake after 13 were killed in an air strike not far from the same spot on Saturday. Misrata, Libya's third city, rose up with other towns against Gaddafi in mid-February and has been under siege for weeks after a crackdown put an end to most protests in the west. Rebels say people in Misrata are crammed five families to a house in the few safe districts, to escape weeks of sniper, mortar and rocket fire. There are severe shortages of food, water and medical supplies and hospitals are overflowing. The insurgents have used containers filled with sand and stone to block roads and break supply lines to Gaddafi forces including snipers in Misrata, the rebel spokesman said. They destroyed lower levels of a multi-storey building, stranding dozen of government snipers. — Reuters Full Feed Generated by Get Full RSS, sponsored by USA Best Price. |
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