Post-Fukushima meeting calls for more work on nuclear safety

A major international conference reviewing the aftermath of the Fukushima disaster in Japan in March 2011 wrapped up Friday calling for more to be done to improve nuclear safety. "We have made headway in the current stage in drawing lessons from the Fukushima accident through this meeting," said China's Li Ganjie, president of the Convention on Nuclear Safety meeting, in closing remarks. "But the process of learning lessons is far from finished. The international community needs to further enhance communication and raise their awareness to a new level ... and reflect upon the accident from a broader perspective. "Measures have to be taken to avoid recurrence of similar accidents while guarding against the harm of radiation," Li said after the five-day meeting at International Atomic Energy Agency headquarters in Vienna. The second extraordinary meeting of the CNS involved around 700 delegates from the 75 states that are party to the 1994 convention, drawn up in the aftermath of the Chernobyl nuclear accident in Ukraine in 1986. A massive earthquake off Japan in March 2011 created a tsunami that swamped the Fukushima Daiichi plant, sending three reactors into meltdown, spewing radiation over a large area and forcing the evacuation of thousands of people. Since then countries with nuclear power have undertaken measures aimed at improving safety that were also reviewed in this week's meeting. They include "stress tests" on power plants, improving emergency preparedness and more international cooperation. Parties to the CNS made several revisions to "procedures and guidance" at the Vienna meeting in order to ensure more robust peer reviews and greater transparency. A working group was also established to report to the next review meeting in March-April 2014 on a list of actions to strengthen the CNS and on proposals to amend, when necessary, the convention.