Vanuatu MP Honorable Andrew Napuat, veteran filmmaker Philippe Carillo, Greenpeace and Dr. Helen Caldicott call for action in the Pacific Region as they fight Japan's plan to dump over one million tons of radioactive wastewater into our Pacific Ocean. 

The Honorable Andrew Napuat and award-winning filmmaker Philippe Carillo (The Fukushima Disaster, the Hidden Side of the Story) are speaking out against Japan's government and the International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) attempts to silence the voices of the people of the Pacific Island Nations by censuring critical data recognized as valid by a growing number of scientists. The Japanese government repeatedly downplays that "treated water" (1.3 million tons of stored unfiltered radioactive wastewater from the 2011 triple nuclear meltdowns which contains at least 63 radionuclides) to be dumped at Fukushima Daiichi is harmless. However, one of the radionuclides, tritium, cannot be filtered, cancer when ingested and bio-concentrates as it moves up the food chain. Scientists are alarmed that some of the radionuclides have not been tested and will bypass the faulty ALPS filtration process. The government of Japan has sent a team of nuclear industry employees to meet with journalists in the Pacific Region with the sole purpose of convincing them that the unfiltered radioactive wastewater will not harm the environment, fish, or humans. However, independent scientists are telling a very different story.

Napuat and Carillo state that the IAEA is not the regulator of the Pacific Ocean. "They are not here to protect us but to promote nuclear power, so we can't trust them," says Napuat, who is featured in Carillo's documentary. He continues, "IAEA Director Rafael Grossi should resign immediately. He refuses to recognize scientific reports from Dr. Robert Richmond (University of Hawaii), Ken Buesseler (Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute), Ferenc Dalnoki Veress (MIIS/CNS), Arjun Makhijani (IEER), and Anthony Hooker (U. Adelaide) and others who say that we must have complete transparency toward the testing process of this nuclear and radioactive pollution, but the IAEA, Japanese government and TEPCO are ignoring them all."

Carillo says, "The Pacific is not Japan's ocean, it is shared by 41 countries, and we will not let Japan endanger our safety, health, and sustenance." He also says, "The Pacific Region has been nuclear-free since 1996, which was hard-won when ratified by the Parliament of Vanuatu. It is a great disrespect towards leaders who fought to make the Pacific Ocean Nuclear Free such as Motarilavoa Hilda Lini, sister of the late Walter Lini, Father of Independence, who won the Nuclear Free Award for Vanuatu when she was Minister of Health in 2005."

Dr. Helen Caldicott, Nobel Prize Nominee, and nuclear radiation expert, is also featured in Carillo's film and says, "It is imperative for the health and well-being of the people of the Pacific that Japan not release over one million tons of quite highly radioactive water into the Pacific, each isotope will bio-concentrate in the aquatic food chain for many, many years and people will eat radioactive fish that will, over time, induce cancers, and genetic aberrations for hundreds of years".

Greenpeace's legendary Rainbow Warrior III docked in Vanuatu last month and Carillo met Senior Campaigner Steph Hodgins-May on-board who released the following statement: "Greenpeace has consistently opposed the Japanese government's plans to discharge radioactive water from the Fukushima nuclear station into the Pacific Ocean. The decision disregards scientific evidence, as well as the concerns raised by fishermen, Japanese citizens, and the international community, especially in the Pacific region and neighbouring countries." She continues, "The legacy of the Fukushima disaster shows that nuclear energy is no solution to the climate crisis, and we must move as quickly as possible towards clean, renewable energy sources and to end fossil fuels."

Extract of the film: https://youtu.be/GfATSGZ6Yvc
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Exposure Films Trust is the copyright holder of many films made in Vanuatu, from Award Winning Film Director Philippe Carillo

This release was published on openPR.