- AP
Japan – Japanese officials have hidden reports of the death of 1200 tonnes of fish along Hokkaido's coastline following the release of treated water from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.
About 1,200 tons of fish washed up on beaches and covered one kilometer of coastline in the city of Hakodate last week.
This makes marine experts confused. Meanwhile, the Japanese government has been inundated with dozens of questions about the dead fish and requests for volunteers to remove the remains.
Ribuan ikan Sarden mati terdampar di pantai Jepang
- Kyodo News
Although the Japanese government has not given an official statement yet, a report by the British newspaper the Daily Mail blamed fish deaths in the northern prefecture on water discharged from the Fukushima nuclear power plant, which has been decommissioned.
The Daily Mail stated that the fish died three months after the controversial release of treated water from a nuclear power plant. However, this was denied by the Japanese fisheries agency.
“We are concerned about unfounded information. No abnormalities were found in the results of the water monitoring survey," said the Japanese fisheries agency's propagation promotion division on Friday.
"We are concerned about the spread of information that is not based on scientific evidence," it added.
Meanwhile, according to the Hakodate fisheries experiment station of the Hokkaido Research Organization, fish sometimes wash up on beaches in large numbers, when the waters they are in experience sudden changes in temperature or when they flee from predators such as dolphins.
“The fish found on the beach are likely part of schools of fish migrating south at this time,” the TV station said.
The dead fish were removed from the shoreline using heavy equipment, city officials said. They also added that the clean-up will last until the end of December due to the large volume of fish.
Photos of the incident show thousands of tons of sardines and some mackerel on the beach, creating a thin blanket along a stretch of beach about a kilometer (0.6 miles) long.
As information, last August, thousands of tons of treated water were released from the Fukushima nuclear power plant by the Tokyo Electric power company.
Fumio Kishida's administration said it needed to remove the water as part of key steps to close the Fukushima Daiichi plant, including the disposal of liquid fuel.
The government later defended accusations of unsafe water and said no radioactive anomalies were found in the discharged water.
