'Please drink' treated Fukushima water, China asks Aso

"A Japanese official said it is okay if we drink this water, so then please drink it," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told reporters, adding Japan's ignorance of the ecological environment is "totally unjustifiable."

Of all of the propaganda and hollow words that the Chinese government spews out, this is by far the most sensible.

I also ask Aso to drink, or at least bathe, in the water.

Does anyone trust the Gov when it comes to Fukushima?

China on Wednesday asked Japanese Deputy Prime Minister Taro Aso to drink treated radioactive water accumulated at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, after he said it is safe to drink it.

"A Japanese official said it is okay if we drink this water, so then please drink it," 

Drink up or shut up Aso.

Taro Aso should move his palatial family home from Kyushu to Fukushima.

The elite have to lead by example...

For once, I agree with China.

'Please drink' treated Fukushima water, China asks Aso

Aso refuses to drink

China refuses to send athletes to the Olympic Games

As it is well known the stuff is nowhere near safe I don’t think he will alas. Having said that China isn’t as pure as the driven snow on environmental issues.

Hehe, the irony of China, one of the worlds greatest and least concerned polluters, complaining about other nations pollution harming them.

What happened to that shaking bueacatic who did drink puddle water from Fucashima on TV early on in the disaster? Aso can as always say it but as always worm his way out of actually doing it.

I dont agree with anything the Chinese government says.

Kind words from the world’s biggest polluter. China has been dumping radioactive waste into the ocean for year, as well as plastics and all kinds of industrial waste.

One of the rare times I'm in agreement with China.

And please wear a Tritium-kun t-shirt while you do it.

best quote ever.

these words will last through world history.

Japan's whatabout logic pertaining to China and Korea releasing waste into the environment doesn't hold. If they want to make a more compelling argument they need to provide information on the amount released and the location. I seriously doubt it was on the scale that TEPCO is planning to release. In addition to the IAEA, I'd like to see UCS (Union of Concerned Scientists) add their voice to this matter.

I HATE to say this but I have to agree with the Chinese gov on this one. Now excuse me while I go and wash out the bad taste in my mouth.

China is spot on with this statement. I also would like to see any Japanese official drink the water that is contaminated with radiation with a mix of chemicals as well.

Dumbest comment ever from a guy known for dumb comments. There must be a manual somewhere in the Diet that instructs them on how to firmly insert one's foot in one's mouth because Japanese politicians really excel at that.

Yeah please dump it in the fisheries..... I mean the Covid mess isn’t enough to wreck the economy so please do some more damage .....

Aso is so stupid about his words. I knew China would ask the question if he expressed it. It seems like Aso dug his own grave about his speech.

Very rarely do I agree with anything China says - but I do here

Ahaha...Aso should drink Fukushima Water as soon as Zhao drinks Yangtze Water.

"Welcome To The Yangtze: A Source Of Life, And Now Death, For 400 Million Chinese Residents"

https://allthatsinteresting.com/yangtze-river-pollution

Maybe Aso can serve some of that treated water to his colleagues during the hot summer days. I'm sure they'll guzzle it down quickly.

"A Japanese official said it is okay if we drink this water, so then please drink it," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told reporters, adding Japan's ignorance of the ecological environment is "totally unjustifiable."

Now I know this,if there is one country around the world which we should never take as example for the environment this is communist China.

Their rhetoric is simply ridiculous and we know why they are fueling all this hatred against Japan,for the Senkaku islands.

Perhapes Lijian should be reminded that his country is the major contributor with this planet pollution.

The Chinese government,an excellent follower of the Soviet rhetorical propaganda.

Simply ridiculous.

I'll buy you a pint, Taro. In fact, I'll buy you two.

Funny that China and Korea also dump waste water in the Ocean.

I’d pay to see that!

"Japanese officials, however, have pointed out some other countries operating nuclear power plants, including China and South Korea, have released treated radioactive water from reactors there into the environment."

and so does every country including the EU and USA.

While I have to agree with China on that matter, it is quite hypocritical to hear it from them at the same time... I mean hearing environmental concerns from one of the top polluters of earth is a joke on itself...

I think I should also add that Japan and Aso are totally wrong ins throwing the water to the ocean and I totally won’t believe in the lies of Aso.

What I feel hypocrite is that such comments which in principle are right comes from China which is not a virtuous of the environment.

If countries like Germany or Sweden would have argued such a thing then I would totally be with them.

China’s aim is not about protect the environment but to find any kind of contest to turn things into a propaganda pro CCP.

And yes,Taro Aso should drink that water.

I would say to Mr. Zhao "you take a big glass of water from the Yangtse River just upstream of Shanghai, take it right out of the river, and I'll drink some TEPCO waste water". I will bet you any amount of money he would beg off that challenge. The people of Shanghai, China's wealthiest and most cosmopolitan city, cannot even drink the water from the faucet it is so loaded with contaminants that their waterworks do not remove. You have to buy bottled water there because the tap water isn't safe. I have traveled all over Europe, drank the tap water and never got sick. Same in Australia and even the Philippines and Papua New Guinea and didn't get sick. Big ol' China with all that wealth and power and you can't even drink the tap water.

It is possible that the treated water is, indeed, safe to drink. If that is so, then instead of releasing it into the ocean, put it into bottles and sell it or give it away free to the public. The first ones to drink it should be the politicians who have been saying that it is safe to drink.

A separate issue is the pollution that is released into the biosphere from China.

In China millions of poor people don't have such a purification system for house, so they have to drink dirty tap water directly everyday.

A separate issue is the pollution that is released into the biosphere from China.

Pollution tritium from nuclear reactors seems same thing from biosphere. All reactors all over the world are releasing more or less tritium from plant into environment (sea, lake, river,,,), because they can't remove tritium from cooling water.

Agree with China, and all Japanese citizens who sit back and don't protest against this government should be forced to drink the water too.

It's safe to say all us expats are on China's side over Japan any day

Funny that China and Korea also dump waste water in the Ocean.

Yeah good logic, people commit murder so I can also commit murder.

Nationalism can really render brain cells dead.

Dentsu have already been employed to produce a cute tritium character to overcome public fears. The treated water is also being referred to as ALPS処理水 where "ALPS" is supposed to mean "Advanced Liquid Processing System". Any similarity to a mountain range in Japan that is home to Japan's best known brand of bottled spring water is merely coincidental.

I am not making this up.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcoG0nzTnm8&t=71s

Yes, they can. It's not easy or cheap, but can be done.

However most countries are actually releasing tritium from reactor into environment, like S Korea, France, Canada, Japan, US, probably China,,,. That's why IAEA admits proper amount of tritium into environment (sea, lake, river).

Sure, as soon as you have a buffet lunch at a food stall in Wuhan...

The parties that should really be concerned are Canada and the US, especially Hawaii since the currents flow out that way.

Drink your "safe" radioactive water. Priceless.

China is correct, if it is safe to drink then bottle it up and sell it as "fuku water"

It's safer than the Chinese regular tap water. The Chinese have to boil it before drinking.

In China there are active nuclear powerplants on the coast. Spokesman Zhao Lijian should explain how the spent water is handled. Don't say it's discharged into sea.

The Chinese government,an excellent follower of the Soviet rhetorical propaganda.

Simply ridiculous.

they have a point, if the treated water is safe to drink then it should be safe to dump into the sea.

PM and his minions should line up at those tanks take a sample cup from each tank and drink up itll go a long way in convincing everybody its safe

If donkeys could fly...People here affirming what a Chinese official has said lol...well, he does have a point, and Aso set himself up for it.

China never misses an opportunity to preach does it? The era of Oneupmanship is upon us and the players are all jokers.

kohakuebisuToday  09:52 am JST

Dentsu have already been employed to produce a cute tritium character to overcome public fears. The treated water is also being referred to as ALPS処理水 where "ALPS" is supposed to mean "Advanced Liquid Processing System". Any similarity to a mountain range in Japan that is home to Japan's best known brand of bottled spring water is merely coincidental.

I am not making this up.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcoG0nzTnm8&t=71s

Yes this is out of the same playbook that CIA operative Shoriki Matsutaro used in broadcasting pro-nuclear energy propaganda on his Nippon Telebi station as well as in his Yomiuiri Shinbun. These actions figured greatly in helping to convince taxpayers to allow nuclear power plants to be built on Japanese soil, which has brought us to this point.

Water under the bridge.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-korea-aso-labour-idUSTRE49K02A20081021

Apparently Aso would only drink this water if mixed with 18yr old whiskey.

Tritium does exists in nature, such as in groundwater. Regular mineral water inevitably contains small doses of radioactive materials. How about Chinese tap water at home? ... Ups, bad example :P

So it seems that in China anyone can become an official spokesman without taking any science courses at school ... how lucky! (or cheating?) :D

Chinese tap water is more intimidating, which is an open secret. As a diplomatic courtesy, Aso better not ask back if the spokesperson can drink it, no matter how loyal he is to the communist party.

The pot calling the kettle black. At least Japan, for the most part, is transparent unlike China. How eco-related disasters has China tried to cover up? But I hate to say it, dumping the nuclear waste water into the sea is a mistake and China seems to know their history when it’s convenient for them.

"same playbook that CIA operative Shoriki Matsutaro used in broadcasting pro-nuclear energy propaganda on his Nippon Telebi station as well as in his Yomiuiri Shinbun. These actions figured greatly in helping to convince taxpayers to allow nuclear power plants to be built on Japanese soil, which has brought us to this point."

!! This. Again and again and again. The story is old. Just more Safe Green men.

Just another dirty page in the Looters playbook. Just another way to steal.

And if there's one thing we all know… the Looters love looting. Especially these Looters, they… Don't Pay.

MeiyouwentiToday  07:43 am JST

Kind words from the world’s biggest polluter. China has been dumping radioactive waste into the ocean for year, as well as plastics and all kinds of industrial waste.

Do you ever hear Chinese politicians saying the water from those oceans is safe to drink? Or the water from the Yangtze River? Hypocrites though they may be, Taro Aso was asking for it with a dumb comment like that.

Ludicrous...how can anyone remark such an insipid statement!!

After millions of people have died from COVID-19, China has something to crow about.

GaijinjlandToday  11:18 am JST

The pot calling the kettle black. At least Japan, for the most part, is transparent unlike China. 

Someone needed to call Aso out for being a useless old moron. The Japanese media and establishment are too spineless, which is why he's been Deputy PM and Finance Minister for the past nine years. Like the late Duke of Edinburgh with a lot less intelligence and lot more actual power.

They aren’t even really affected, located west of Japan with sea area between. They also don’t care about other things themselves,like contamination or pollution of air, affecting all surrounding countries, so you can’t sometimes healthily breath or dry your clothes outside if the winds come from China’s direction. That’s again only their pure CCP propaganda. And of course, nothing significant would happen if you drink a glass of that processed and again filtered water. lol You surely would get some more problems with yearly too many x-ray photographs or long distance flights and such.

Aso should drink and bathe in Tritium laced Fukushima radioactive water!

It might breathe some life into his lifeless soul!!

Tritium does exists in nature, such as in groundwater. Regular mineral water inevitably contains small doses of radioactive materials.

Now I understand why IAEA admits proper amount of tritium from reactors into environment (sea, lake, river).

They might regret asking this if drinking it turns him into Super Taro.

Please drink' treated Fukushima water, China asks Aso

Well, if I have the choice between that and tap water from Beijing, I choose the former. Someone should give Zhao Lijian the challenge.

Suntory should bottle it and come up with some hooky sales pitch.

Let's be real: dumping toxic mercury into a river that supplies drinking water and fish that people consume is obviously much more dangerous than dumping radioactive water into the sea. I don't believe there is any comparison possible due to the natural high rate of dispersion of contaminated water into the Pacific Ocean. (Bivalves, the shellfish, do concentrate radioactivity in their bodies, however.)

China and Korea's positions are further weakened by the impending dumping being on the Pacific side of Honshu. As far as providing a virtous example of following international laws and agreements, China in particular hasn't got a leg to stand on.

Readers of JT should think again before being so quick to jump onto China's and Korea's bandwagon. This is a dangerous neighborhood, and full of hipocrytes.

Just because China commits crimes against the environment that doesn't give Japan a free pass!!

China's effort on environmental issues.

BBC: Climate change: China's forest carbon uptake 'underestimated'

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-54714692

Ahaha...Aso should drink Fukushima Water as soon as Zhao drinks Yangtze Water.

But Zhao didn't claim that Yangtze water was safe to drink.

Your drink Tritium every time you take a glass of water or even radon when you buy a bottled water from a pure well.

"I have heard that we will have no harm if we drink" the treated water.

Only a total Aso would say something that stupid.

kyakusenbi:

Your drink Tritium every time you take a glass of water or even radon when you buy a bottled water from a pure well.

I breathe in exhaust particles everytime I walk along a busy road, but that doesn't mean it's the same as putting my face in front of a car's exhaust pipe and breathing in the particles heavily for several minutes.

Everytime we go out in the summer, we're exposed to UV, but that doesn't mean it's ok to use a sun-bed 24/7. The amount of rolling my eyes do really is hurting me.

Let’s have a party, Aso and all members of the cabinet drink THAT water and , sure, all these Chinese commies drink their polluted water, All these Korean lunatics drink their water. Let7s have WATER!!

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian, please read this article written by your own scientists:

Monitoring and management of tritium from the nuclear power plant effluent

by Qiaoe Zhang et al 2018 IOP Conf. Ser.: Earth Environ. Sci. 108 042057

available open access at this link:

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1755-1315/108/4/042057/pdf

Hate China as many might, but this... "A Japanese official said it is okay if we drink this water, so then please drink it," classic! Plus, I love the dig about "Japan must not forget this historical tragedy" when talking about Minamata, which they are bang on about, but clearly hinting at much more.

If J-politicians saw what China said and how very well they said it, I have no doubt they are mad at Aso -- not for the old codger putting his foot even further in his mouth, but because China so incredibly embarrassed him and the nation.

Please drink it, Aso... Drink long, and deep.

WOW China finally said something with "MEANING"!! In the mean time China clean your air, and stop people from pooping on the streets!!

Japan dumps radioactive water in the ocean

China denounces it

Booo! Japan, what are you doing! China is right!

Meanwhile, China keeps polluting more than anyone else

Booo! China, you can't blame Japan when you're worse!

While this goes on, everyone keeps polluting the planet pretty much he same

What I'm trying to say is, the blame is on everyone, and jumping to easy conclusions after a catchy remark isn't gonna help anyone.

We should be working together for a safer future, instead of worrying about which country pollutes the world the most. Pollution doesn't give a s**t about country borders.

China is perfectly correct.

It's full of comments from people who can't even distinguish between drinking water and drinkable water.

You can extract drinkable water from urine in a survival situation, but no one uses it as drinking water in their daily life.

It's the same thing.

I lived in Shanghai and drank the tap water. But maybe my building had a purification system.

Our wai-po's building there is quite old and has no filtration. We end up drinking Nongfu Spring water.

Our Chinese friends are not without a sense of humor!

Perfect suggestion to this big Aso.

Japan is a global joke. I have family in Fukushima. When the disaster happened, I told them to get out of area because plant is melting down as stated in global news. But my family said NHK and Japanese government that they have situation under control and everything is okay, even after the roof blew off the reactors. I think to this day most Japanese think everything is okay. Over 10 years and they still havent got the situation under control. If you look at most of the problems of Japan, they are handled in same way. Nuclear melt down and then sweep everything under the rug, so no one can see and tell everyone its okay. Works in Japan but rest of the world is not that gullible. Watch as Japan will decline for another 35 years and fall into 3rd world state.

Question: Is contaminated water from Fukushima less harmful because other nations also did it in the past?

Also using China’s contribution to world pollution as a justification or excuse for what Japan is planning does not really improve the global environment, does it.

On a factual basis, the water will be clean enough to drink, although I don't see any politicians being brave enough to drink it. Why not use it for irrigation, instead?

I think the real problem with releasing the treated water is the graphics. The headline, "Releasing Radioactive Water," pretty much ends the discussion, even if the water is safe.

Fukushima shows Japans skills to deal with problems, up next Olympics...

Japan is a global joke. I have family in Fukushima. When the disaster happened, I told them to get out of area because plant is melting down as stated in global news. But my family said NHK and Japanese government that they have situation under control and everything is okay, even after the roof blew off the reactors. I think to this day most Japanese think everything is okay. Over 10 years and they still havent got the situation under control. If you look at most of the problems of Japan, they are handled in same way. Nuclear melt down and then sweep everything under the rug, so no one can see and tell everyone its okay. Works in Japan but rest of the world is not that gullible. Watch as Japan will decline for another 35 years and fall into 3rd world state.

That is why it is important who you are voting for. Never again. No more nightmare

If the water is good enough to drink, the government should just recycle it into Tokyo's drinking water.

Hehe, the irony of China, one of the worlds greatest and least concerned polluters, complaining about other nations pollution harming them.

Per-capita China pollutes less than Japan.

Crashpilot

Question: Is contaminated water from Fukushima less harmful because other nations also did it in the past

Answer: It is not harmful because Tritium is well understood and naturally present in sea water, which is why other nations are releasing it in the present (not the past) without the artificial hype we see about Fukushima.

You are welcome.

One thing that is certain is that the Japanese government will need to do a hell lot better when it comes to PR and showing the population that it is safe (IF it is safe). After the 1966 Palomares B-52 crash in which hydrogen bombs were dropped in the region (including one at sea), Spain’s then-Minister of Information, Manuel Fraga Iribarne, and United States Ambassador, Angier Biddle Duke, went as far as to splash around Palomares' Quitapellejos beach as means to prove to people that the waters were safe to swim in.

The ball is still in Japan's court until further notice.