LDP questions plan to let Fukushima evacuees go home

“The time will definitely come that someone must say ‘they cannot live in this area but they would be compensated,’” Ishiba was quoted as saying in the Asahi Shimbun newspaper.

Stop prolonging the agony!

Relax radiation limits ???? The people already working there are being screwed over by the companies that hired them. Now the Gov. Wants to relax limits to exposure ...so what ? Later when the people that worked here can get sick and get screwed again ?

It is now preparing to remove 400 tons of highly irradiated spent fuel from a damaged reactor building, a very dangerous operation that has never been attempted before on this scale.

Who knows ? Maybe they won't have to fight over the size of the Olympic Stadium - there may be no "place" and "no-one" around if there's the slightest accident when removing the rods...

ALL of Japan needs to be informed that that area of 'CRAWLING DEATH' will continue to grow in size and that more people will have to leave their ancestrial homes due to it.

What a black joke Japan is becoming around the world-while the melted corium still emits death dealing amounts of high radioactive poison into the ocean and air 24/7, ignorant officials talk of 'relaxing' the limit on radioactive exposure?????

"The government should identify areas that will never be habitable."

And of course this is the reality they keep fighting uselessly against, and why nuclear power is too extreme when the full consequences of a serious accident are fully recognized.

wow how sad. compensated or not you cant really replace someones home.

It is utterly ridiculous that the government STILL promises to move everyone back, and now they are talking about 'relaxing radiation levels' for popularity points??? Put safety first, and tell these people like it is -- many of them will never, ever, live back in their original homes again. Lots of rural areas in Shikoku and other places that are more or less abandoned; put them there and set them up -- give them a life instead of this constant false hope.

The plant operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO), has been struggling to stop radiation leaks from the wrecked plant.

WRONG! WRONG AND WRONG! They did there outmost trying to save money!

If you are too old and WANT to die in your hometown etc??? Bu just plain madness to allow regular young people, children with an actual future get anywhere even remotely close to that horrible nuclear mess!! IMHO

My guess is that Japanese Govt has a plan to ensure the area will be safe. Japanese Govt is secretive except Aso, It has to hurry. Dignitaries from other countries will be there 2 years later. I'd bet Japanese Govt does not want these guests find it is a ghost town.

To be fair, Ishida spoke nothing but the truth when he said that authorities might have to relax limits for radiation exposure if anything was ever going to be done in terms of re-building the area. The key there was the "IF". Who's going to live or work in an area where there is a relaxed limit on radiation, potentially increasing the risk of radiation-induced medical issues? The homeless? Property values in such an area would be rock-bottom, that's for sure.

Unlike the Field of Dreams, in this case if they build it, they (the new residents) won't come.

Hey, Tohoku won the baseball, the people of Tohoku have been given hope and will happily move back especially if the safe level is revised down.