20000224

British ship

carrying

N-waste

arrives in Japan

TOKYO: A British ship carrying nuclear waste arrived at a northern Japanese port on Wednesday, police and nuclear company officials said.

The Pacific Swan, carrying 52 tons of treated radioactive waste, docked at Mutsu-Ogawara port in Aomori prefecture (state), said Hideki Akaishi of Japan Nuclear Fuel Ltd.

It was the fifth such shipment of high-level waste reprocessed in France and sent back to Japan since 1995, Akaishi said, adding that Wednesday's was the largest.

Mutsu-Ogawara is 576 kilometres (357 miles), northeast of Tokyo. Local police said dozens of members of civic groups rallied peacefully against the shipment at the port early Wednesday.

The waste was to be unloaded and transferred to a storage facility in the village of Rokkasho by Wednesday evening, Akaishi said.

Activists say Rokkasho is a dangerous place for storage because it sits on at least two active earthquake faults.

In the late 1970s, France agreed to treat nuclear waste from Japanese nuclear power plants on condition that it be sent back to Japan for final storage.

Japan depends on nuclear energy for about a third of its electricity needs. The nation's nuclear industry has been plagued by accidents and cover-ups in recent years.ÑAP