Hongaars voorzitterschap vergadert over situatie Japan
Brussels, 14 March 2011 Hungarian Presidency follows closely the events in Japan
At today’s meeting of environment ministers, the Hungarian Presidency has expressed its condolences to the victims and their family members in Japan. Although Japan is a country well prepared for earthquakes, the sheer size of the catastrophe makes international help and coordination necessary.
Taking into account the graveness of the events and the rapidly developing situation, the Hungarian Presidency, together with the Commission aims to facilitate the collection, sharing and evaluation of information. As a first step, we have requested the Commission to provide information to the environmental ministers at the start of today’s Council meeting. The Presidency will call the meeting of the competent Council working group (Working Party on Atomic Questions) to inform the Member States and lead an expert discussion. The Presidency stands ready to continue the work in the respective Energy Council structures.
According to the information received from the Commission, the EU Civil Protection Mechanism has been activated and an officer from the Monitoring and Information Center (MIC) is already in Japan. The task of the MIC in this case is to coordinate the help offered by EU Member States. As of today morning, 20 Member States have offered their help. Our Japanese partners have informed us that they did not need any assistance for search and rescue, but sanitary and medical assistance (water purification equipment, medical teams) might be requested.
In addition to the humanitarian situation, the events also raise the question of nuclear safety. At the moment the events have no consequences on European population. Radiation levels in all Member States are normal.
We must emphasize that decision on the use of nuclear energy belongs to the sole competency of the Member States. According to the information received from the Commission currently 14 Member States use nuclear energy. The European Union has powers to regulate safety standards which are laid down in Directive 2009/71/Euratom. The EU has also supported some of the Member States to close down older and less safe nuclear power plants.
Commissioner Oettinger i has called the meeting of national nuclear safety regulators and nuclear power plant operators for Tuesday, 15th March 2011. In the light of the developing events and based on the information from the Commission, the Hungarian Presidency will put the necessary questions on the agenda of the Working Group on Atomic Questions and stands ready to coordinate further actions in the Council.
For further information, please contact Mr. Gergely POLNER at +32-491-355-460 or Mr. Márton HAJDU at +32-491-355-457.