From Volume 38, Issue 16 of EIR Online, Published Apr. 22, 2011
Asia News Digest

Malaysian NGO Runs EIR-LPAC Material Refuting Anti-Nuclear Hysteria

April 15 (EIRNS)—JUST International, a non-governmental organization in Malaysia run by Chandra Muzaffar, who has followed LaRouche for many years, published on their widely read website an hysterical anti-nuclear diatribe by a Malaysian doctor who was once president of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW). The article argued that all low-level radiation is dangerous, that "ionizing radiation" is a threat to mankind (perhaps there is no sunshine in Malaysia?), and that all nuclear power must be stopped. When EIR wrote protesting such insanity and sending articles by EIR and LaRouchePAC ("Japan's Fukushima Plant—Media Lies Incite Anti-Nuclear Hysteria" by Ramtanu Maitra, and an LPAC leaflet "Was the Japanese Earthquake Forecastable?" on material by Italian Prof. Pier Francesco Biagi), Muzaffar responded that he would post both articles, which indeed appeared at the top of the JUST website today.

Russian, French Nuclear Agencies Agree, Fukushima is Not Chernobyl

April 14 (EIRNS)—The Fukushima nuclear power plant situation cannot be compared to Chernobyl, Russia's nuclear chief said yesterday. Rosatom director General Sergey Kiriyenko, visiting China, told reporters that the situation at the Fukushima plant is not as bad as he had thought, and that his agency's estimates show that it does not even reach Level 6, although its official severity rating had just been raised to Level 7, the same as Chernobyl.

"It is hard for me to assess why the Japanese colleagues have taken this decision," he told reporters, referring to Japan's reclassification of the event as a Level 7. "I suspect this is more of a financial issue than a nuclear one." Kiriyenko appeared to suggest that the Japanese authorities were seeking to reduce the burden on insurance companies. "I guess that maybe it could be linked to the definition of force majeure with regard to insurance? I would pay attention to that. It is a bit strange," he said.

France's nuclear safety agency had earlier disagreed with the decision to intensify the hysteria. "At present ... Fukushima is not, nor will it be, Chernobyl, even though it is a very serious accident," the head of the Institute for Radiological Protection and Nuclear Safety (IRSN) Patrick Gourmelon, said on April 12.

All rights reserved © 2011 EIRNS