Antinukes will have to wait

August 8, 2012

Noda to postpone Wed. meeting with antinuclear rally hosts

http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20120808p2g00m0dm016000c.html

TOKYO (Kyodo) -- Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda decided Tuesday to postpone a meeting scheduled Wednesday with organizers of the antinuclear demonstrations held every Friday in front of the premier's office, government sources said.

The decision comes as smaller opposition parties submitted a no-confidence motion against his Cabinet to the lower house and a nonbinding censure motion against the premier to the upper house late Tuesday in opposition to Noda's key policy goal of a sales tax hike.

Noda will rearrange his schedule to hold talks with the organizers, the sources added, with Chief Cabinet Secretary Osamu Fujimura saying at a press conference that the premier is "willing to listen to various voices."

Members of the Metropolitan Coalition Against Nukes, who had protested against the resumption of two nuclear reactors at the Oi power plant on the Sea of Japan coast, had asked former Prime Minister Naoto Kan and other Diet members to arrange a meeting with Noda.

Noda is believed to have been reluctant to meet with the organizers, but was forced to change his stance, considering the growing scale of the protests every Friday, which have drawn tens of thousands of people in recent weeks.

The government decided in June to reactivate the Nos. 3 and 4 nuclear reactors at the Oi plant in Fukui Prefecture for the first time since Japan suffered its worst nuclear plant crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi complex last year.