Allegations of deep ties between TEPCO and the Japanese mafia

The Atlantic Wire reports that the connections between Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) and the yakuza, or Japanese mafia, go much deeper than just the recruiting of laborers desparate enough to take jobs in Fukushima Daiichi's hazardous radiation fields. Commenting on the desparation of taking a job at Fukushima Daiichi, a yakuza explained it as "folk wisdom": “When a man has to survive doing something, it’s the nuclear industry; for a woman, it’s the sex industry.”

The article quotes a Japanese federal senator: "TEPCO's involvement with anti-social forces and their inability to filter them out of the work-place is a national security issue. It is one reason that increasingly in the Diet we are talking de facto nationalization of the company. Nuclear energy shouldn't be in the hands of the yakuza. They're gamblers and an intelligent person doesn't want them to have atomic dice to play with." The senator added: “The primary difference between TEPCO and the yakuza is they have different corporate logos...They both are essentially criminal organizations that place profits above the safety and welfare of the residents where they operate; they both exploit their workers. On the other hand, the yakuza may care more about what happens where they operate because many of them live there. For Tokyo Electric Power Company, Fukushima is just the equivalent of a parking lot.”

Japan PM declares Fukushima Daiichi stable, but many don't believe him

As reported by the New York Times, Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda, in a nationally televised address last week, declared that the four destroyed units at Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant have been brought under control, and "cold shutdown" will be achieved by year's end, ending a catastrophic chapter in Japan's history. However, critics warn that the decommissioning and "clean up" of the site could take 40 years, and that nuclear criticality in the melted cores is still a risk. Noda's announcement comes with an "all clear" from federal, prefectural, and local authorities for many of the 90,000 nuclear evacuees to return to their homes for the first time in nine months, but many of them question such assurances, and people across Japan still fear the documented radioactive contamination of the food supply.

Meanwhile, the Mainichi Daily News reports that a journalist, Tomohiko Suzuki, worked undercover inside the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant for over a month this summer, and now reports that "absolutely no progress is being made," that rushed work is often shoddy and done for cosmetic, not safety purposes, and that major short cuts are being taken on such vital activities as decontaminating vast quantities of cooling water highly contaminated with radioactivity. Suzuki quotes one worker as saying "Working at Fukushima is equivalent to being given an order to die," and reports that many games are being played to under-report actually radiation doses being suffered by workers.

The article reports: " '(Nuclear) technology experts I've spoken to say that there are people living in areas where no one should be. It's almost as though they're living inside a nuclear plant,' says Suzuki. Based on this and his own radiation readings, he believes the 80-kilometer-radius evacuation advisory issued by the United States government after the meltdowns was "about right," adding that the government probably decided on the current no-go zones to avoid the immense task of evacuating larger cities like Iwaki and Fukushima." (emphasis added)

New book about Japanese mafia's role in Fukushima Daiichi aftermath

Tomohiko Suzuki, a journalist who worked undercover for over a month at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant last summer (see entry above), has just published a book on December 15th, detailing many of his experiences at the plant and connections between yakuza crime syndicates and the nuclear industry, titled "Yakuza to genpatsu" (the yakuza and nuclear power).

While the yakuza helped deliver food, medicine, and other vital supplies to populations cut off in the immediate aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami last March, since there have been reports of the nuclear industry paying huge sums to the yakuza to recruit workers for the Fukushima Daiichi emergency operations. The yakuza have pressured people deeply in debt to take the jobs, and there are reports that "low level" workers at the destroyed nuclear plant are not paid very well at all for their very risky work, and the inevitable health impacts it will have on them in the future.

Japan May Declare Control of Reactors, Over Serious Doubts

"TOKYO — Nine months after the devastating earthquake and tsunami knocked out cooling systems at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, causing a meltdown at three units, the Tokyo government is expected to declare soon that it has finally regained control of the plant’s overheating reactors.

But even before it has been made, the announcement is facing serious doubts from experts.

...Experts say that if it does announce a shutdown, as many expect, it will simply reflect the government’s effort to fulfill a pledge to restore the plant’s cooling system by year’s end and, according to some experts, not the true situation." New York Times

Australian investigative reporters says Fukushima workers gagged

Mark Willacy (left) an investigative radio reporter with the Australian Broadasting Corporation says Fukushima workers are being forbidden from talking to the media while TEPCO is going to great lengths to keep activities at the crippled plant secret. One former worker at the plant told the ABC how they were given sub-standard protective gear after the accidents. Reported Willacy: "'I was not told how much radiation I would be exposed to or how high the radiation would be,' says this man who worked at the Fukushima plant during the meltdowns. 'They just gave me an anorak to wear and sent me to work. I worked at installing vents inside the reactor buildings to get rid of the steam so we could avert another explosion,' he tells me. There's a good reason why this Fukushima worker doesn't want his identity revealed and that's because like others, he's been gagged."