Japan’s PM makes first visit to Fukushima

Clean-up workers at Japan’s stricken Fukushima nuclear plant have welcomed the first visit of the country’s new Prime Minister.

Yoshihiko Noda has only been in the job for a week – but he is well aware that sorting out his country’s nuclear crisis is a top priority.

The clean up is being run by the military. At the height of the emergency, 100, 000 of Japan’s 230 thousand soldiers were brought in, to search for survivors and bodies, and to clear roads. Noda thanked them for their efforts.

Fukushima’s four nuclear reactors were crippled by the earthquake and tsunami in March, in which 20 000 people were lost. Leaking radiation devastated the area – and led to a crisis of confidence in Japan’s nuclear industry as a whole.

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