Japan PM promises to never abandon tsunami victims

Prim Minister Naoto Kan today promised the tsunami survivors of Japan that his government would "never abandon" them, as he surveyed for the third time the disaster-hit zone where the radiation-leaking Fukushima nuclear plant is yet to be stabilised.

Kan visited a fishing area in Ishinomaki in Miyagi prefecture, the worst-hit in the March 11 magnitude-9 quake and tsunami that left nearly 30,000 people dead or unaccounted for in Japan's northeast.

"The government will give all its strength to work with you. We will never abandon you," Kan spoke at a radio station after surveying the devastated fishing region.

He promised the locals that the government would do all it can to help them rebuild their lives and revive the damaged fishing industry.

At the Fukushima nuclear complex, workers were preparing to dispose off highly radioactive water to a nuclear waste processing facility and turbine condensers.

They were expected to soon start pumping out the more than 50,000 tons of highly radioactive water that is filling an underground trench to a nearby storage place inside the No. 2 reactor turbine building.

Plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) is working to lay hoses between the turbine buildings and the facility, national broadcaster NHK said.

Holes have already been bored in the walls of the buildings, but work to install the hoses has yet to begin.

Amid concerns raised by countries like South Korea over the release of low-level radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean by workers at the Fukushima plant, Kan acknowledged Japan should have given firmer explanations to the neighbours.

Kan also visited a Self-Defense Forces (SDF) headquarters in Sendai, where the SDF and US troops in Japan have set up a joint office for relief work, and thanked American military for its cooperation.

Reports said that a worker at the Fukushima complex had to be taken to hospital after complaining of sickness.

The cause of his sickness was not yet known but he had no apparent injuries, the plant's operator said.

"He was conscious but somewhat wobbly. He could walk if assisted," said a spokesperson.

In their battle to cool down an overheated reactor, engineers have sealed a crack leaking highly radioactive water into the Pacific Ocean. Today, they began installing a "silt curtain" to try to prevent radioactive mud from spreading.

A report said that a high level of caesium had been found in the konago fish caught in Fukushima.

During his visit to a devastated fishing port in the city, Kan told members of the local fisheries industry that the government would select ports that should be preferentially reconstructed under a rehabilitation programme.

The Prime Minister told Governor Yoshihiro Murai of Miyagi prefecture that the central government would build 70,000 temporary houses as quickly as possible.