A Japanese court yesterday upheld an order to keep two reactors at the Takahama nuclear power plant closed, operator Kansai Electric Power said, leaving efforts to get a struggling nuclear industry up and running in limbo.
The court decision, upholding a petition from residents living near the plant concerned about safety, keeps the legal battle center stage in a struggle by Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s government to restore nuclear power five years after the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant disaster.
The Otsu District Court on March 9 ordered Kansai Electric, Japan’s second-biggest utility, to shut down the reactors in Fukui Prefecture west of Tokyo, in the country’s first injunction to halt an operating nuclear plant.
The nuclear industry has only recently started to get reactors in a nuclear sector, which used to supply about one-third of the country’s power, back online amid widespread public opposition after the meltdowns at Fukushima in 2011.
Yesterday’s decision denied the utility’s attempt to temporarily halt the shutdown order.
Kansai has separately requested that the court revoke the injunction and a decision on that is expected to come sometime soon, possibly by next month.
“It is very regrettable that the petition for stay of execution was not approved,” Kansai Electric said in a statement, adding that it hoped that the court would cancel the injunction soon.
Should Kansai Electric lose this legal fight, it would be left with the option of appealing to a higher court. That could mean months, or possibly a year, of delays and extra purchases of oil, gas or coal to replace nuclear power generation.
Japanese lower courts sometimes hand down contentious verdicts that are then overturned by higher courts, where judges tend to be more attuned to political implications, judicial experts said.
Amid mounting public skepticism over nuclear safety, local residents have lodged injunctions against nuclear plants across Japan.
Japan has 42 operating reactors, but Kyushu Electric Power is the only utility that has been generating nuclear power after it was cleared to restart two reactors in southwestern Japan.
In this case, legal action by residents failed to prevent the restarts of those reactors.
A Kansai Electric spokesman said the losses from the shutdown of the two Takahama reactors amounted to ￥10 billion (US$95.9 million) per month because of higher fossil fuel consumption and other factors.
Hungarian authorities temporarily detained seven Ukrainian citizens and seized two armored cars carrying tens of millions of euros in cash across Hungary on suspicion of money laundering, officials said on Friday. The Ukrainians were released on Friday, following their detention on Thursday, but Hungarian officials held onto the cash, prompting Ukraine to accuse Hungary’s Russia-friendly government of illegally seizing the money. “We will not tolerate this state banditism,” Ukrainian Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrii Sybiha said. The seven detained Ukrainians were employees of the Ukrainian state-owned Oschadbank, who were traveling in the two armored cars that were carrying the money between Austria and
Kosovar President Vjosa Osmani on Friday after dissolving the Kosovar parliament said a snap election should be held as soon as possible to avoid another prolonged political crisis in the Balkan country at a time of global turmoil. Osmani said it is important for Kosovo to wrap up the upcoming election process and form functional institutions for political stability as the war rages in the Middle East. “Precisely because the geopolitical situation is that complex, it is important to finish this electoral process which is coming up,” she said. “It is very hard now to imagine what will happen next.” Kosovo, which declared
MORE BANS: Australia last year required sites to remove accounts held by under-16s, with a few countries pushing for similar action at an EU level and India considering its own ban Indonesia on Friday said it would ban social media access for children under 16, citing threats from online pornography, cyberbullying, online fraud and Internet addiction. “Accounts belonging to children under 16 on high-risk platforms will start to be deactivated, beginning with YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, Threads, X, Bigo Live and Roblox,” Indonesian Minister of Communications and Digital Meutya Hafid said. “The government is stepping in so that parents no longer have to fight alone against the giants of the algorithm. Implementation will begin on March 28, 2026,” she said. The social media ban would be introduced in stages “until all platforms fulfill their
Counting was under way in Nepal yesterday, after a high-stakes parliamentary election to reshape the country’s leadership following protests last year that toppled the government. Key figures vying for power include former Nepalese prime minister K. P. Sharma Oli, rapper-turned-mayor Balendra Shah, who is bidding for the youth vote, and newly elected Nepali Congress party leader Gagan Thapa. In Kathmandu’s tea shops and city squares, people were glued to their phones, checking results as early trends flashed up — suggesting Shah’s centrist Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) was ahead. Nepalese Election Commission spokesman Prakash Nyupane said the counting was ongoing “in a peaceful manner”
RSS