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It has been a year since the Japanese government decided to purify contaminated water from the Fukushima nuclear power plant and discharge it into the sea.

Construction of the passage has begun with the goal of releasing it to the sea next spring, but Japanese fishermen as well as experts are strongly opposed to it.



Correspondent Park Sang-jin from Tokyo reports.



<Reporter> This



is a video distributed by the Japanese government through YouTube in October of last year.



It emphasizes the recovery process of the Fukushima nuclear power plant and the safety of the discharge of contaminated water into the sea.



As if considering the backlash from neighboring countries, the subtitles are in Korean and Chinese.



[Rafael Grossi/Secretary-General of the International Atomic Energy Agency: Japan's chosen ocean discharge method is technically feasible and is in line with international practice.]



Preparing for discharge next spring, Japan, which is preparing for discharge next spring, will establish a channel to drain contaminated water around the nuclear power plant. We are working on making it.



After making a tunnel of about 1 km in length by drilling a 3 m diameter undersea bedrock, the contaminated water purified by a multi-nuclide removal facility is discharged into the sea.



The Japanese government has announced that it will use a budget of 300 billion won to compensate for the loss of fishermen caused by the discharge into the sea.



However, the distrust of the fishermen remains.



[Kishi/Chairman of the National Fisheries Cooperative Association: I am opposed to the release of the sea, so the sense of distance I feel toward the government is the same (as it was a year ago).

(I have no confidence in TEPCO) at all.]



Civil society and academia are also very concerned about the release.



[Kenichi Oshima/Professor at Ryukoku University: The amount of radioactive material emitted from the Fukushima nuclear power plant is enormous.

It is not something that Japan simply decides to release.]



Japan is repeating the claim that the treated water is safe, but even its fishermen and experts are unable to convince them.