About 7,000 Japanese seek compensation from TEPCO over nuclear crisis

About 7,000 residents living in an area adjacent to Fukushima Prefecture filed an appeal with the Nuclear Damage Compensation Dispute Resolution Center (NDCDRC) on Monday, demanding compensation worth 1.85 billion yen (about 15 million U.S. dollars) from the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) .

In the first collective appeal made by residents who have not been compensated by TEPCO, the operator of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, a total of 7,128 residents from northern Tochigi Prefecture, about 100 km from the nuclear plant, argued that they should get compensation even though they were not living in Fukushima at the time of the 2011 disaster.

"It is 'irrational' to those people differently from the Fukushima residents who decided to evacuate on a voluntary basis and received compensation, as the same amount of radiation was detected in Tochigi," their leading lawyer Koji Otani said.

"We want TEPCO to take seriously the fact that over 7,000 people raised their voices," Otani told a press conference at the Tochigi prefectural government office.

One of those residents, 45-year-old Mako Tezuka said, "I let my (elementary school) child play in the garden without knowing radiation levels immediately after the accident."

"Four years later, I still haven't received any explanation or apology from TEPCO and I'm only left with worries about the future and health of my child," she said.

The residents, who were living at the time in Otawara, Nasushiobara, and Nasu, are also demanding an apology and the establishment of a fund to pay for decontamination work and health checkups, their lawyers said. Endi