Japan commemorates Thursday March 11 the tenth anniversary of the triple disaster of March 11, 2011 (earthquake, tsunami and nuclear accident), which permanently traumatized the entire nation.

The heavy human toll of nearly 18,500 dead or missing was caused mainly by a gigantic tsunami, whose building-high waves hit the coast of northeastern Japan shortly after the 9.0 magnitude earthquake. .

The ensuing nuclear accident at the flood-swamped Fukushima Daiichi power plant, where the cores of three of the six reactors melted, left entire cities uninhabitable for years from radiation and forced dozens of thousands of people to leave.

It was the worst nuclear accident since that of Chernobyl (Ukraine) in 1986.

Restricted ceremonies

Many public and private ceremonies are planned in the region, as well as in Tokyo, and a minute of silence is to be observed at 2:46 p.m., the precise time of the 2011 earthquake, one of the most violent on record in the country. world.

In Miyagi, one of the three most damaged departments in the northeast, search operations are being organized by residents who still hope to find a loved one.

The odds may seem slim, but the remains of a woman swept away by the tsunami a decade ago were identified last week, freeing her son from excruciating uncertainty and allowing him, at last, to mourn.

Thursday, in Tokyo, still under a state of emergency in the face of the pandemic, small-scale ceremonies are planned at the National Theater of Japan, where Emperor Naruhito and Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga are to deliver speeches.

The coronavirus is also weighing on other commemorations, such as in Taro (Miyagi department), where residents are used to meditating at the top of the anti-tsunami wall, hands clasped but, this year, they are applying physical distancing .

These commemorations are held only two weeks before the scheduled departure, in Fukushima, of the Olympic torch relay for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, called "Reconstruction Games".

The shadow of the pandemic hangs over the event, postponed to this year, but the Japanese government and organizers hope that the relay will refocus attention on this bruised region.

With AFP

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