Former Mayor of Futaba Town in Fukushima Appeals in 8 European Countries

Katsutaka Idogawa on protecting the right to evacuate: "The  20mSv/y limit 
dose is madness. Being exposed to radiation is an exposure to violence."

Katsutaka Idogawa, former Mayor of Futaba Town, the site of the Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant, will travel to France, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Estonia, Latvia, and Switzerland.  He will be reaching out to municipal leaders and citizen groups about the ongoing situation in Fukushima.

Seven days after the disasters of March 11, 2011, Idogawa temporarily evacuated town residents 45 kilometers away to Kawamata City. After witnessing ashes floating down from the sky, fallout from the explosion at reactor no. 1, and measuring radiation levels on his dosimeter, he came to the conclusion that the only way for the people of Futaba to be safe would be to be as far as possible. Without waiting governmental advice, he put the safety of the people first and arranged for the town to be relocated to Saitama prefecture.

On May 12 he will meet with citizen groups at Penly Nuclear Power Plant in Le Havre, France on the English Channel where fires in April 2012 led to radioactive leakage. For a map of nuclear sites in France visit the Greenpeace France the Nuclear Around You page. From May 13-15, he will participate in an international conference aboard Peace Boat on its way to Stockholm.  Participants include:

• Alain Correa (STOP EPR Network, France)- sign the petition to stop construction of next nuclear reactor here
• Olivier Florens (Europe Ecology – The Greens)
• Iida Tetsunari (Director, Institute for Sustainable Energy Policies)
• Lena Lindahl (Sustainable Sweden Association)
• Andrey Ozharovskiy (Nuclear expert with Bellona working to prevent the construction of a plant by Hitachi in Lithuania)
• Sato Kenta (“Fukushima Conference”, from Iitate Village)
• Yoshioka Tatsuya (Co-founder and Director of Peace Boat) 

Fire at Penly Nuclear Power Plant April 2012

After meeting with experts, politicians and citizens working on nuclear issues at an event organized by ICAN Sweden, IPPNW Sweden, and the Sustainable Sweden Association on the 16th, he will travel to the location of planned nuclear power plant at Pyhäjoki, Finland to meet with the mayor and citizens from the 17-18th. Despite protests, Toshiba has won the bid to build this plant making it the 6th plant in the country. According to the Nuclear Heritage Network, the site of the proposed plant, on the untouched Hanhikivi peninsula, is an important nesting area for almost twenty endangered bird species and migrating arctic birds. Furthermore, the plant is at risk of having no access to cooling water in the winter months due to pack ice in the gulf of Bothnia.

Signs warning of the radiation that goes hand in hand with the
 impending nuclear plant at Pyhäjoki. For more images click here

From May 19-22nd he will visit Helsinki and Latvia, making his way to the Middelgrunden Wind Farm in Copenhagen for May 24-25. He will end his tour with a presentations to the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland.