WILLINGNESS TO FORGET
In an editorial published on the fifth anniversary of the Fukushima nuclear accident, French newspaper "Le Monde" said the government of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is "eager to turn over the page of Fukushima" and has shown a "willingness to forget."
The Japanese government admitted in August 2013 that at least 300 tons of highly-contaminated water flowed freely into the Pacific Ocean every day and the problem might linger for ages.
However, in September the same year, when Japan was bidding for the 2020 Olympic Games, Abe told the international community that the crisis was "totally under control."
It has also been revealed this February that Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), the operator of the Fukishima nuclear power plant, had knowledge of multiple meltdowns at the plant's reactors following the tsunami, but intentionally withheld that information until months later.
Yuko Yoshida, secretary-general of Japan Women's Network for Chernobyl Health Survey and Health-Care Support for the Victims, noticed the different attitudes of the Japanese media reporting the Chernobyl and Fukushima nuclear accidents.
She pointed out that during the past three decades, mainstream Japanese media have been constantly fixing their eyes on Chernobyl. Yet after Fukushima, they have basically refrained from in-depth investigation and reporting on the health hazards caused by the Fukushima nuclear disaster.
Similar attitudes existed in the research community. Professor Valery Stepanenko, a leading Russian specialist in medical and environmental dosimetry and radiation safety, told Xinhua that he asked his Japanese counterparts why Japan had not performed a retrospective analysis of the radiation doses received by the population, but the Japanese scholars were either silent or vague about it.
"As a result, doses of iodine tablets received by children at that time remain unknown, but they are very important for proper follow-up treatment," Stepanenko said.
FEAR OF IMAGE DAMAGE
According to Ken Buesseler, a senior researcher at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, a U.S. private non-profit organization, the Japanese government has not been doing a good job communicating with the public.
Information disclosure needs to be improved, so that the general public would know more about the level of nuclear contamination and its influence on health, he suggested.
The expert, who has been studying the Fukushima nuclear accident's impact on maritime environment since 2011, told Xinhua that the impact was unprecedented, as 80 percent of the leaked radioactive substance has flown to the sea.
However, the Japanese government has kept claiming that everything is "completely under control" and that any negative impact on the environment "is completely blocked."
Observers from around the world have pointed out that the Japanese side has deliberately toned down the nuclear accident's long-term impact on health, food safety and the environment. Adding to Tokyo's worry are concerns that the image of Japan would be stained and the safety of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics be questioned.
However, underestimating the long-term impact of the accident could lead to slack supervision on affected food, and might also produce unrealistic optimism in the Japanese government that could result in careless handling of the aftermath, experts warned.
According to Chen Xiaoqiu, deputy chief engineer with the Radioactive Safety Center of the Chinese Ministry of Environmental Protection, remedial efforts include restoring the environment, cleaning up nuclear contamination and processing nuclear waste and studying the biological survival environment and the radiation impact on human bodies.
Given Japan's handling of the incident, an independent investigation initiated by international experts is necessary to reveal the truth of the disaster whose aftermath spills well beyond the Japanese border, said Buesseler.
