BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 X-WR-CALNAME:www.indybay.org PRODID:-//indybay/ical// v1.0//EN BEGIN:VEVENT UID:Indybay-18827901 SEQUENCE:18977702 CREATED:20191106T201800Z DESCRIPTION:11/11/19 SF Speak Out At Japan Consulate To Stop Restarting of Japanese NUKE Plants & Olympics In Japan\nFor The Defense of Fukushima Children and Families And Against Abe Gov Cover-up & Olympics In Fukushima and Japan\nStop PM Abe’s Big LIE and Fraud On The People Of The World That Fukushima is SAFE!\n\nMonday November 11, 2019 3:00 PM \nSan Francisco Japanese Consulate \n275 Battery St near California St. \nSan Francisco \n\nJoin No Nukes Action NNA at the San Francisco Japanese Consulate to protest the continued Japanese Abe government efforts to force Japanese children and their families back to Fukushima although Fukushima is still contaminated. Even the new Japanese environmental minister Shinjiro Koizumi, has called for permanently shutting down the nation's nuclear reactors to prevent a repeat of the 2011 Fukushima disaster. His comments came just a day after Koizumi's predecessor recommended dumping more than one million tons of radioactive wastewater from the power plant into the Pacific Ocean.\n\n The government claims that Fukushima has been “decontaminated” but the three reactors still have melted nuclear rods which they have not been able to remove. In addition, there is over 1 million tons of contaminated radioactive tritium water in thousands of tanks surrounding the broken nuclear plants in Fukushima. They still need to cool the rods by flooding water into the reactors. \n\nThere are also thousands of bags in Fukushima filled with radioactive waste with no place to go and many of these contaminated bags have also washed away during the recent typoons. \n\nIn a major propaganda scheme to lie to the world, the Abe government has lied to the Olympic committee that not only is Japan safe but Fukushima should host the baseball games and Special Olympics. It is spending tens of millions of dollars preparing the Azuma sports stadium to push a big lie that everything is OK.\n\n They continue to claim despite evidence to the contrary that the Fukushima problem had been solved and that it was “decontaminated” and ready for the Olympics. This is was an overt brazen lie and falsification of the real situation and show the real political charter of the Abe government. The government also plans to bring in immigrant workers as contract laborers and use them for the clean-up without proper training and safety.\n\nAt the same time, there is an increase in the amount of cesium in the waters around Fukushima nearly eight years after the explosion of the nuclear plants and contamination of Fukushima, Japan, and the world. The Abe government is also pushing for militarization and removal of Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution that prevents military interventions outside Japan. They are also pushing for a new US military base in Okinawa despite the opposition of the mass of Okinawan people and the governor. This base would also have US nuclear ships and weapons which is presently against the US-Japan Security Agreement. The US has already violated this agreement many times and used Okinawa as a base for illegal wars around the world.\n\nThe majority of Japanese people are opposed to restarting Japan’s nuclear plants including the previous 3 prime ministers who are worried that Japan would be destroyed with another disaster like Fukushima. Again this shows that the Abe government has contempt for the people it supposedly represents. Join the rally and speak out. \n\nThe Abe government is also remilitarizing Japan and passed a conspiracy law and secrecy law to use to intimidate journalists and investigators who are exposing this crisis.\nThey are attacking Zainichi Koreans children and whipping up xenophobia and racism while firing anti-war teachers.\n\nDefend the people of Fukushima, Japan and the world. \nStop The Restart of ALL Japan NUKE Plants\nDefend the Children and People of Fukushima\nNo Olympic Baseball Games at Fukushima and Olympics in Japan\nNo Militarization and War In Asia\n\nFor more event information: \nhttp://nonukesaction.wordpress.com \n\nAlso join NNA when we screen Korean Schools in Japan\n100 years of struggle against discrimination\n\n11/10/19 Berkeley Screening Korean Schools in Japan 100 years of struggle against discrimination\n\nKorean Schools in Japan\n100 years of struggle against discrimination\n\n(Documentary film – 99 min, 2019, - Japanese with English subtitle) by Ko Chinyu\n\nSunday, November 10th, 2019\n\n1:30- 4:00 pm (Door Opens 1:10)\nAt: Berkeley Central Public Library, 3rd-Floor Meeting Room 2090 Kittridge St., Berkeley, CA 94704\n\nKorean schools in Japan were established right after WWII, and at the early years, there were about 500 schools and 50,000 students were there. Shortly after, the US occupational force GHQ and the Japanese government ordered them to close down. However, after a long struggle, there are about 60 schools from kindergarten to university that still exist now.\n\nIn 2010, the Abe government decided that senior high school education should be free. However, in 2013, the government decided to omit the Korean schools from this subsidy. Local governments also decided to cut the funding.\n\nThis film was produced by a nonfiction writer Ko Chanyu and this is his first documentary film.\n\nSponsored by No Nukes Action\n\nhttps://nonukesaction.wordpress.com\n\n\nJapan's New Environmental Minister Calls for Closing Down All Nuclear Reactors to Prevent Another Disaster Like Fukushima\n"We will be doomed if we allow another nuclear accident to occur.”\nhttps://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/09/12/japans-new-environmental-minister-calls-closing-down-all-nuclear-reactors-prevent?cd-origin=rss\n\nPublished on \nThursday, September 12, 2019\n\nbyJessica Corbett, staff writer\n 17 Comments\n\nJapan's newly appointed environment minister, Shinjiro Koizumi, held a news conference on Wednesday at his ministry in Tokyo. (Photo: KYODO)\nJapan's new environmental minister, Shinjiro Koizumi, called Wednesday for permanently shutting down the nation's nuclear reactors to prevent a repeat of the 2011 Fukushima disaster, comments that came just a day after Koizumi's predecessor recommended dumping more than one million tons of radioactive wastewater from the power plant into the Pacific Ocean.\n\n"I would like to study how we will scrap them, not how to retain them."\n—Shinjiro Koizumi, Japanese environmental minister\nKoizumi was appointed to his position Wednesday as part of a broader shake-up of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's cabinet. He is the 38-year-old son of former Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, a vocal critic of nuclear energy.\n\n"I would like to study how we will scrap them, not how to retain them," the younger Koizumi, whose ministry oversees Japan's nuclear regulator, said during his first news conference late Wednesday. "We will be doomed if we allow another nuclear accident to occur. We never know when we'll have an earthquake."\n\nIn March of 2011, a powerful earthquake triggered a tsunami that caused the meltdown of three nuclear reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant on Japan's northeastern coast, forcing tens of thousands of people to flee radiation around the plant. It was the world's second-worst nuclear disaster, after Chernobyl.\n\nAfter the disaster, all 54 of Japan's nuclear reactors were shut down. Reuters reportedWednesday that "about 40 percent of the pre-Fukushima fleet is being decommissioned" and only six reactors are currently operating. Amid drawn out legal battles over the impacts of the meltdown, campaigners have ramped up opposition to nuclear power generation in the country.\n\nHowever, some Japanese politicians, including the current prime minister, have argued that nuclear energy is necessary to meet national climate goals. Japan's new trade and industry minister, Isshu Sugawara, criticized Koizumi's call to shutter the country's reactors. "There are risks and fears about nuclear power," Sugawara said. "But 'zero-nukes' is, at the moment and in the future, not realistic."\n\nAccording to The Guardian:\n\nJapan's government wants nuclear power to comprise 20 percent to 22 percent of the overall energy mix by 2030, drawing criticism from campaigners who say nuclear plants will always pose a danger given the country's vulnerability to large earthquakes and tsunamis.\n\nAbe, however, has called for reactors to be restarted, arguing that nuclear energy will help Japan achieve its carbon dioxide emissions targets and reduce its dependence on imported gas and oil.\n\nDespite Abe and Sugawara's stances, "the government is unlikely to meet its target of 30 reactor restarts by 2030," due to local opposition and legal challenges, noted The Guardian.\n\nThe Telegraph reported Thursday that Koizumi "was a surprise addition" to Abe's cabinet, considering that the new minister "has expressed sharp differences with senior members of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party since he was first elected in 2009 and supported a rival in the most recent election for party president."\n\nPolls often indicate that Koizumi is considered a popular contender to serve as the next prime minister—and Abe's choice to appoint him to the cabinet, according to The Telegraph, is "seen as an effort to give a new generation of politicians an opportunity to learn the ropes of government."\n\nKoizumi replaced Yoshiaki Harada, who made headlines around the world earlier this week. Responding to a projection from Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO) that the utility will run out of storage space for contaminated groundwater around the Fukushima plant around the summer of 2022, Harada suggested during a news conference Tuesday that "the only option will be to drain it into the sea and dilute it."\n\nAs Common Dreams reported Tuesday, Harada's comments were swiftly condemned by critics of nuclear energy both in Japan and around the world as well as the neighboring government of South Korea.\n\nJapan’s radioactively contaminated waste washed away during Typhoon Hagibis\nhttp://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_international/914010.html\nPosted on : Oct.21,2019 17:48 KST Modified on : Oct.21,2019 17:48 KST \nFacebook 페이스북\nTwitter 트위터\nprint 프린트\nLarger font size 글씨크기 크게\nSmaller font size 글씨크기 작게\nUnconfirmed number of sacks of contaminated plant matter lost amid rising river waters\n\nA storage facility for radioactively contaminated waste resulting from the Fukushima nuclear disaster. (Hankyoreh archives) \nMore radioactively contaminated waste matter was spilled in Japan as a result of Typhoon Hagibis, with many contaminated soil storage suits left in unverifiable condition, studies show. \nThe Japanese Ministry of the Environment announced on Oct. 17 that it had confirmed the loss of sacks containing radioactive waste from two sites in Nihonmatsu and Kawauchi-mura, Fukushima Prefecture. In Nihonmatsu, 15 large sacks containing tree branches and other waste matter collected during decontamination efforts were reportedly washed away by rising river waters. In Kawauchi-mura, 18 sacks of waste matter were found downriver, two of them missing all of their contents. \nSacks containing radioactively contaminated grass and wood were previously confirmed to have been lost in the Fukushima Preference communities of Tamura and Itate-mura. The city of Tamura announced on Oct. 17 that 17 of the 19 lost sacks had been recovered, 10 of them empty. The sacks appeared to have opened up, spilling their waste matter into the river. Tamura previously speculated that the contents might not have spilled out of the sacks, but its predictions were not borne out. \nUnclear whether waste was intentionally released or accidentally spilled\n“Prior to recovering [the sacks] from the river, we had no idea [the contents had fallen out],” a city official told the Tokyo Shimbun newspaper. A total of 2,667 sacks containing radioactive waste had been stored at a temporary storage site in Tamura; the total number lost has yet to be confirmed.\nIn many cases, it remains impossible to verify how well the contaminated soil discovered in the decontamination process was being stored, the Tokyo Shimbun reported. Contaminated soil and waste from the decontamination process are frequently kept at temporary storage sites by Japanese local governments. \nOf the seven prefectures and 43 basic local governments with temporary storage sites set up, four Shimonita-machi in Gunma Prefecture, Manumori-machi in Miyagi Preference, and Soma and Minamisoma in Fukushima Prefecture had their sites rendered inaccessible to employees due to the effects of landslides and rising river waters, the newspaper said. The latest example of radioactively contaminated waste being lost is not the first.\nIn 2015, 240 sacks of decontamination waste were carried from a temporary storage site in Itate-mura amid heavy rains, with some of them subsequently tearing open and releasing their contents.\nBy Cho Ki-weon, Tokyo correspondent\n\nJapan excludes Zainichi Korean children from free preschool education\nhttp://english.hani.co.kr/arti/english_edition/e_international/915734.html\nPosted on : Nov.4,2019 17:44 KST Modified on : Nov.4,2019 17:44 KST \nFacebook 페이스북\nTwitter 트위터\nprint 프린트\nLarger font size 글씨크기 크게\nSmaller font size 글씨크기 작게\n\nOn Nov. 2, Zainichi Koreans and Japanese residents rallied in Tokyo in response to the Japanese government’s exclusion of Chosen gakko (Korean schools in Japan sponsored by North Korea) from a policy to provide free preschool education. Chosen gakko supporters allied with civic groups and human rights activists accused the government of discriminating against children. AS of Oct. 1, the Japanese government has provided 25,700 yen (US$237.37) per month for every child in preschool, with the exception of children in preschools affiliated with the Chosen gakko.\n\nJapanese Embassy withdraws approval for Vienna art exhibit\n\nThe "Japan Unlimited" exhibition, held since late September with the help of the Austrian Foreign Ministry, features some works on the theme of the 2011 Fukushima nuclear crisis as well as Japan's wartime history.\n\nhttps://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20191106/p2g/00m/0et/045000c\n\nNovember 6, 2019 (Mainichi Japan)\n\nThis supplied photo of an item of artwork at an exhibition in Vienna shows blood depicted in the shape of Japan's rising sun symbol streaming down from radiation protection gear. (Kyodo)\nVIENNA (Kyodo) -- The Japanese Embassy in Austria has withdrawn its approval for an art exhibition in Vienna to mark 150 years of bilateral diplomatic ties, deeming some politically and socially critical art works inappropriate, according to the embassy and organizers.\n\n【Related】Controversial Japan art exhibit reopens with tighter controls\n\nThe "Japan Unlimited" exhibition, held since late September with the help of the Austrian Foreign Ministry, features some works on the theme of the 2011 Fukushima nuclear crisis as well as Japan's wartime history.\n\nSome artists participating in the Austrian event had also taken part in the "After 'Freedom of Expression?'" exhibition in Nagoya that had sparked controversy.\n\nThe withdrawal of approval came after an unidentified Japanese lawmaker who learned of the artists' participation in both the Nagoya and Vienna exhibitions asked the Japanese Foreign Ministry to look into the matter, according to Japan Unlimited curator Marcello Farabegoli.\n\nThe embassy said its officials who visited the exhibition concluded it does not facilitate mutual understanding and friendship between the two countries and notified the organizers of the retraction of its approval on Oct. 30.\n\nThe exhibition, scheduled to run through Nov. 24, will now go on without the official logo indicating the event as a project for the anniversary year.\n\nArt works at the exhibition included one showing blood depicted in the shape of Japan's rising sun symbol streaming down from radiation protection gear and a video of a person posing as Prime Minister Shinzo Abe apologizing to China and South Korea for the country's wartime aggression.\n\nA piece based on a picture of Emperor Hirohito, posthumously known as Emperor Showa, and Douglas MacArthur, the supreme commander of the Allied Powers that occupied Japan after World War II, also satirizes Japan's postwar relations with the United States.\n\nThe Vienna exhibition was meant to highlight some of Japan's "most active artists engaging with the limits and opportunities of politically and socially critical art in their country," according to the curator's website.\n\nJapan's "After 'Freedom of Expression?'" exhibition, held as part of the Aichi Triennale 2019 art festival between Aug. 1 and Oct. 14, prompted a backlash in some quarters as it featured a statue symbolizing "comfort women" who were forced to work in Japan's wartime military brothels.\n\nThe exhibition ran for 10 days in total due to a flurry of protests and threats.\n\nJapan's culture agency announced in September its decision not to provide state subsidies for the Aichi art festival, saying it was not informed in advance that the exhibition could trigger an outcry that would jeopardize the event's smooth operation.\n https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2019/11/06/18827901.php SUMMARY:SF Speak Out At Japan Consulate To Stop Restarting Japanese NUKE Plants & JPN Olympics LOCATION:SF Japanese Consulate\n275 Battery near California\nSan Francisco URL:https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2019/11/06/18827901.php DTSTART:20191111T230000Z DTEND:20191112T000000Z END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR