Japan's central prefecture Niigata Sunday called on the central government to have the International Atomic Energy Agency inspect a nuke plant that was affected by a major earthquake on July 16, Kyodo News reported.
The local government submitted a petition to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, several Cabinet ministers and the nuke plant's operator Tokyo Electric Power Co., the report said, quoting unnamed officials.
The Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear plant, the world's largest in terms of output capacity, has reported some 50 incidents since a magnitude 6.8 quake rocked the area. The incidents included a fire, leakage of water containing radioactive material, detection of a small quantity of radiation from a ventilation filter and toppling of drums containing low-level radioactive waste.
Two days after the quake, chief of the International Atomic Energy Agency Mohamed ElBaradei said that IAEA would be ready to join Japan in investigating the incidents at the nuclear power plant. "Japan needs to go into full investigation of the structure, of the systems, of the components of the reactor," ElBaradei said during a visit to Malaysia.
The petition said that problems of the plant has caused concerns and that rumors would harm local tourism and industries. It said that "appropriate information needs to be disseminated."
The major quake shook Niigata and nearby prefectures on the morning of July 16, killing ten and injuring over a thousand people. By Saturday, some 2,600 people still stayed in shelters in Niigata prefecture.
The nuclear plant, which is designed to resist 6.5 magnitude earthquake, has become a major safety concern since the earthquake. According to a Kyodo News survey released Sunday, over 80 percent of evacuees of the earthquake expressed anxiety over the nuclear plant's safety.
