Japan, China meet to ease concerns over nuclear wastewater discharge
TOKYO — Japan said Sunday that its experts have held talks with their Chinese counterparts to try to assuage Beijing’s concerns over the discharge of treated radioactive wastewater from the wrecked Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant into the sea.
The discharges have been opposed by fishing groups and neighboring countries, especially China, which banned all imports of Japanese seafood. China’s move has largely affected Japanese scallop growers and exporters to China.
During the talks Saturday in the northeastern Chinese city of Dalian, Japanese officials provided “sciencebased” explanation of how the discharges have been safely carried out as planned, according to the Japanese Foreign Ministry.
A 2011 earthquake and tsunami damaged the Fukushima plant’s power supply and reactor cooling functions, triggering meltdowns of three reactors and causing large amounts of radioactive wastewater to accumulate. After more than a decade of storage in tanks taking up much space on the complex, the plant began discharging the water after treating it at least once and diluting it with seawater Aug. 24, starting a process that’s expected to take decades.
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed at their summit meeting in November to hold scientific talks by experts, and the countries have since held a number of informal meetings. Sunday’s statement from the Japanese Foreign Ministry was its first public acknowledgment of the talks.
The experts exchanged views on “technical matters” involving the discharges, the ministry official said on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the issue. While stressing the importance of transparency, the official declined to give any other details, including what the Chinese side said and whether their differences have been narrowed.
The meeting comes just after International Atomic Energy Agency chief Rafael Mariano Rafael’s visit to the plant in mid-march, confirming that the ongoing discharges have been safely carried out as planned.
Violence in Ecuador: Armed gunmen attacked a group of people in Ecuador’s coastal city of Guayaquil, killing eight people and injuring eight, the Interior Ministry said, the latest in a string of violent incidents in the South American country.
Around 7 p.m. local time Saturday, armed men arrived in a vehicle in the southern neighborhood of Guasmo, witnesses said. They shot at a group of people, killing two of them. Six others later died in a health center from the “seriousness of the wounds,” the ministry told journalists.
No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack.
It was the second mass killing in as many days. On Friday, five people who had been kidnapped were killed execution-style in the coastal province of Manabi by an armed gang. Police said there were signs that the victims were tourists mistakenly caught up in a local drug-trafficking dispute.
In that incident, an armed group had kidnapped 11 people. Police said the other six, including five minors, were rescued and handed over to their families. Two suspects were arrested Saturday morning.
The killings in Manabi “remind us that the battle continues,” President Daniel Noboa said Saturday on the social media network X, formerly Twitter.
King at Easter services: King Charles III shook hands and chatted with onlookers after attending an Easter service Sunday at Windsor Castle in his most significant public outing since being diagnosed with cancer last month.
The king, dressed in a dark overcoat and shiny blue tie, smiled as he made his way along a rope line for about five minutes outside St. George’s Chapel, reaching into the crowd to greet supporters who waved get-well cards and snapped photos on a chilly early spring day.
“You’re very brave to stand out here in the cold,” Charles told them.
“Keep going strong,” one member of the crowd shouted as Charles and Queen Camilla walked by.
The 75-year-old monarch’s appearance was seen as an effort to reassure the public after Charles stepped back from public duties in early February following an announcement by Buckingham Palace that he was undergoing treatment for an unspecified type of cancer.
British media reported last week that Charles would slowly increase his public appearances after the Easter holidays.
The service itself was smaller than usual as Kate, the Princess of Wales, is also being treated for cancer and has paused public duties. The princess, her husband Prince William and their children did not attend.