Each year since March 11, 2011 those of us who live in Vermont Yankee’s evacuation zone have gathered to support the people of Fukushima, Japan. They continue to suffer the loss of the homeland of their families and ancestors, their farmlands and businesses. 2016 marks the 5th year of this on-going tragedy. Please join Safe & Green Campaign on Saturday March 12th for a vigil between 10:00 am and noon at Pliny Park, the corner of Main Street & High Street in Brattleboro.
If it were not for the nuclear reactors, Japan would have recovered from the tsunami and earthquake by now. Instead, 80,000 people still cannot return home, four Fukushima reactors have melted through, radiated water continues to gush into the Pacific, 9 million bags of contaminated soil and debris are piled all around the country, and solutions by the owner and government fail time and again. They now admit that decommissioning four reactors in four different states of collapse, with fuel rods sunk to the earth, is beyond current technology. Under a new state secrets law, Japanese journalists are jailed for reporting the facts. Money for refugees and decontamination is drying up and is instead flowing to Tokyo for the Olympics in 2020.
This is a humanitarian and environmental crisis on a scale the world has never seen before. Vermont Yankee is the same age, make and model as those in Fukushima. We who live in Yankee’s evacuation zone feel a special solidarity with the victims. Please honor them.
Contact: Leslie Sullivan Sachs
safeandgreencampaign@gmail.com
