On August 24, in disregard of the strong criticism and opposition from the international community, the Japanese government unilaterally started the release of the Fukushima nuclear-contaminated water into the ocean. A relevant official of the China Atomic Energy Authority (CAEA) told the media that what the Japanese government has done seriously undermined the authority and credibility of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), severely harmed people’s health and rights and interests of marine environment in neighbouring countries, and gravely jeopardized security and development interests of global nuclear energy industry. China firmly opposes and strongly condemns it. The Japanese side should immediately stop this erroneous act.

The Japanese government has been wantonly using the IAEA’s Comprehensive Report released last month, hyping up the safety and harmlessness of the nuclear-contaminated water, and started the ocean discharge. This is extremely selfish, irresponsible and in disregard of global public interest. In fact, the IAEA has conducted a review of Japan’s ocean discharge plan at the request of the Japanese side, which is of the nature of technical assistance and advisory service. Neither has it the force of the international law, nor can it give legitimacy and legality to Japan’s ocean discharge plan.

The scope of the review of the IAEA was strictly limited by Japan, which has no mandate to evaluate other treatment plans for the nuclear-contaminated water, or the effectiveness and long-term reliability of the treatment facility. The IAEA has only reviewed and made a judgement based on the data and information provided by Japan, and conducted inter-laboratory comparison (ILC) with a small amount of samples of nuclear-contaminated water collected by Japan itself. Under such circumstances that the authenticity of data and the accuracy of information remains to be verified and independence and representation of sampling is severely insufficient, the conclusion of the IAEA’s review, which lacks adequate scientific or factual basis, is one-sided and has its limitations.

To date, the Japanese government failed to prove the legitimacy and legality of the ocean discharge decision, the long-term reliability of the purification facility, and the authenticity and accuracy of the nuclear-contaminated water data. It failed to prove that the ocean discharge is safe and harmless to the marine environment and people’s health. Japan also failed to have thorough and meaningful consultations or reach any understanding with other stakeholders including China. Nor has it delivered on its commitment to the IAEA to establishing international long-term monitoring and on-site oversight arrangements led by the IAEA and participated by stakeholders. The Fukushima nuclear accident which took place 12 years ago has already caused the leakage of large amounts of radioactive substances into the ocean. There could be a man-made secondary disaster to the local people and the whole world if Japan chooses to dump the water into the ocean just to serve Japan’s selfish interests.

China urges Japan to immediately stop its wrongdoing. Japan should not discharge the nuclear-contaminated water into the ocean, without providing credible evidence on the legitimacy of the ocean discharge, reliability of the purification facility, authenticity of the source term data and uncertainty of environmental impacts, etc., seeking understanding with stakeholders including its neighbouring countries, or establishing long-term monitoring and on-site oversight arrangements led by the IAEA and recognized by stakeholders.