Berlin, Germany (Weltexpress). Ethecon Foundation Ethics & Economics declares its solidarity with all those who are taking to the streets today, on the 13th anniversary of the Fukushima disaster, to protest against the irresponsible handling of the Fukushima disaster by those responsible at TEPCO and the government as well as the resistance against nuclear energy.
Nuclear energy is dangerous, expensive and incalculable!
The nuclear disaster in Fukushima – like the nuclear accident in Chernobyl before it – has shown what can happen if we do not move away from nuclear energy: evacuated and uninhabitable regions, sick people, worldwide radioactive contamination and enormes costs. More than 27,000 people in Fukushima Prefecture are still unable to return home. It is still unclear where to put millions and millions of tons of nuclear-contaminated soil and water.
The nuclear phase-out will not be given to us as a gift! We have to fight for it, because nuclear energy is an extremely profitable business.
Nuclear energy is not a climate saver!
Even before the COP28 climate conference in Dubai took place, the nuclear lobby tried to establish nuclear power as an indispensable climate savior. Not only were the dangers and risks trivialized, but the fact that nuclear energy produces several times more climate-damaging CO2 than solar, hydro and wind power along the entire value chain from uranium mining to fuel element production was also concealed. Added to this are the emissions caused by the need for final disposal over thousands of years.
Nuclear energy is a precondition for the atomic bomb!
The EU nuclear bomb is currently even being discussed in Europe. The German Vice-President of the EU Parliament, Katarina Barley, proposed this scandalous step in order to be independent of US nuclear weapons.
But one thing is clear: nuclear weapons can never protect people, they pose an enormous threat to our livelihood and generations of people.
TEPCO is responsible for the disaster in Fukushima!
The Fukushima meltdown in 2011, with all its victims and consequences, was and is a terrible culmination of the use of nuclear energy. And it is a climax of the crimes of the TEPCO group responsible for Fukushima in alliance with the state and politics (called the “nuclear village” in Japan). Both the extent of the catastrophe and the inhumane nature of the actions of those responsible at TEPCO and in the government became clear once again in 2023, when they started dumping the radioactively contaminated TEPCO wastewater into the Pacific despite all the worldwide protests and are still doing so today.
Back in 2011, ethecon Foundation Ethics & Economics pilloried those responsible and major shareholders of TEPCO internationally with the International ethecon Dead Planet Award. It states: “… The major shareholders and senior management are responsible for the decisions and actions of the TEPCO Group. They are responsible for the ruin of human health and the destruction of the environment on a grand scale, and even the death of many people. They not only pose a threat to peace and human rights, but also to democracy, ecology and humanity as a whole. They act for the benefit of personal power and private enrichment. In the name of profits, they trample on morals and ethics and accept the destruction of the earth as a ‘black planet’.”
On the occasion of the protests on the 13th anniversary of Fukushima, ethecon reiterates the demands associated with the International Dead Planet Award 2011:
-Immediate phase-out of nuclear energy!
-Sozialization of the TEPCO group under truly democratic control!
-Comprehensive liability of TEPCO’s Executive Board, Supervisory Board and major shareholders, including their private assets, for all damage caused by TEPCO to people and the environment around the world!
-Judicial punishment of TEPCO’s Executive Board, Supervisory Board and major shareholders for the crimes committed by the company against people and the environment!
In honorable memory and mournful respect, we bow to all victims of TEPCO’s crimes.
Our solidarity greetings to all of you who are fighting against the crimes of the TEPCO Corporation!
You must know that the opponents of capital despotism and profit crimes all over the world are proud of you and stand with you against the power of capital and corporations.
We are fighting together against these crimes in Japan, Germany, elsewhere in the world and recently also in space!
Our strength is our solidarity.
Our common slogan is:
They will not pass!
No pasaran!
ノー・パスラン
Düsseldorf/Tokyo 11.03.2024
