Japan’s triple disaster: An indictment of capitalism

• The political lesson that needs to be drawn from Japan’s triple disaster is that capitalism has proven incapable of ameliorating the devastating impact of the forces of nature. As in the case of the Asian tsunami that wrecked havoc in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India and Thailand in 2004, and Hurricane Katrina that destroyed much of New Orleans in 2005, the vital needs of working people have been sacrificed to private profit.
• The Buddha of Fukushima's Forbidden Zone: A Photo Essay
• The Buddha Of Fukushima 1-Year Later
• Japan tsunami debris expected soon in Hawaii

Peter Symonds, World Socialist Web Site

Reuters

One year after Japan’s triple disaster—the March 11 earthquake, tsunami and nuclear meltdown—the scenes of  devastation remain. Reconstruction has barely begun in flattened coastal towns. Mountains of rubble and debris have  not been cleared. The area for 20 kilometres around the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant is uninhabited and will  remain so for years. Its damaged reactors will not be completely decommissioned and removed for 30 to 40 years.

The human tragedy is immense. More than 15,000 people died in the disaster and another 3,000 are still missing.  Whole communities were destroyed, together with jobs, businesses and long established patterns of life. Over  300,000 people are still in temporary accommodation, attempting to rebuild their shattered lives. Many young people  have been forced to leave the northern Tohoku region to look for employment elsewhere.

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Related:

The Buddha of Fukushima's Forbidden Zone: A Photo Essay, Nathalie Kyoko (with photos by Naoto Matsumura), Japan Subculture Research Center  

Jeanette Eastman, Associate Editor, Evergreene Digest
This is the story of Naoto Matsumura, Tomioka City, Fukushima Prefecture, Japan–the last man standing in   Fukushima’s Forbidden Zone...He takes care of the animals, “the sentient beings”, that remain behind because no  one else will.  He is the Buddha of the forbidden zone.
 

The Buddha Of Fukushima 1-Year Later, Jake Adelstein, goodreads

Jeanette Eastman, Associate Editor, Evergreene Digest
"Nothing has improved inside the 20km zone."
 

Japan tsunami debris expected soon in Hawaii, Associated Press, CBC News

Jeanette Eastman, Associate Editor, Evergreene Digest
Refrigerators, TVs and other debris dragged into sea when a massive earthquake hit Japan last March, causing  tsunamis as high as 40 metres to crash ashore, could show up in remote atolls north of Hawaii as soon as this winter,  with other pieces reaching parts of the West Coast in 2013 and 2014, experts say.