Japan's nuclear regulator has granted approval for utility Tokyo Electric Power Company, which ran the destroyed Fukushima nuclear power plant, to start releasing more than a million tonnes of radioactive water.
- The International Atomic Energy Agency had already approved Japan's planned water release
- China will increase its scrutiny on food from Japan
- South Korea has supported the plan following its own investigation and the IAEA report
The global watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said a two-year review showed Japan's plan for the release would have negligible environmental impact.
The Japanese regulator's certificate was the final step the utility required to begin the process.
However, China will increase its scrutiny of food from Japan and maintain curbs on some Japanese imports, the government said, citing Tokyo's decision to discharge treated radioactive water from the crippled Fukushima plant into the sea.
China's customs administration said in a statement it was stepping up monitoring of products including seafood and keeping curbs on produce from one-fifth of Japan's prefectures for safety reasons.
In the immediate aftermath of the 2011 disaster, China banned the importation of food and agricultural products from five prefectures. It later widened its ban to 12 prefectures, before removing two of them.
Under the Japanese plan, the water will first be filtered to remove most radioactive elements except for tritium, an isotope that is difficult to separate from water, and diluted to well below international standards.
China will "strengthen supervision" and "rigorously examine" certificates for food imports, especially aquatic products, from the other non-banned prefectures, the administration said, emphasising restrictions on the 10 prefectures remain in place.
Meanwhile, South Korea said Japan's plan to discharge treated radioactive water from its tsunami-wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant met global safety standards and it respected the UN nuclear watchdog's approval for the release.
South Korea's assent for the plan comes after it conducted its own assessment and as the old north-east Asian rivals have been taking steps to improve their ties.
"Based on a review of the treatment plan of contaminated water presented by Japan, we have confirmed concentration of radioactive material meets standards for ocean discharge," South Korea's minister in the Office for Government Policy Coordination, Bang Moon-kyu, told a briefing in Seoul.
"Therefore the plan meets international standards including those of the IAEA," he said.
Reuters