The Japanese government was forced to quickly withdraw an animated character it hoped to gain support for its decision to release more than 1 million tonnes of polluted water from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station into the sea this week.
Although the water is treated before it is released, it still contains tritium, a radioactive hydrogen isotope represented on a government website by a cute fish-like creature with rosy cheeks.
The appearance of the character in an online flyer and video on the Reconstruction Agency’s website angered Fukushima residents.
“It seems that the government’s desire to release the water into the sea is given priority over everything,” Katsuo Watanabe, an 82-year-old fisherman in Fukushima, told the Kyodo news agency. “The gap between the severity of the problems we face and the vitality of the character is huge.”
Riken Komatsu, a local writer, tweeted: “If the government thinks it can make the general public understand by just creating a cute character, it makes a mockery of risk communication.”
Social media users call the character Tritium-kun – or Little Mr Tritium – an apparent reference to Pluto-kun, which appeared in the mid-1990s to soften the image of plutonium on behalf of the nuclear industry in Japan.
The reconstruction agency, which oversees recovery efforts in the region devastated by the earthquake, tsunami and March 2011 crash, removed the promotional material on Wednesday, a day after it appeared.
Experts believe that tritium is only harmful to humans in large doses, and that the treated water with dilution poses no scientifically observable risk.
The character was created to explain that the release of tritium into the sea is the standard at nuclear power plants around the world.
Local fishing communities say the release of water will destroy a decade of hard work to rebuild consumer confidence in their seafood.
The government said work to release the diluted water would begin in two years, and the process is expected to take decades.
“Nuclear power stations are very specialized and difficult to understand,” an official told Kyodo, adding that the tritium mascot would be redesigned to take public sentiment into account.
Japan’s decision to drain the water also angered neighboring countries. According to a spokesman for the president, Moon Jae-in, South Korea said it was considering going to the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea, possibly to get an order.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry said the release of the water would set a bad precedent for disposing of wastewater. “The ocean is not the trash of Japan, the Pacific is not the sewer of Japan,” said Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian.
Zhao invited Japan’s Deputy Prime Minister Taro Aso to drink some of the treated water, after Aso said it was harmless enough to consume. “A Japanese official said it’s okay if we drink this water, so please drink it,” Zhao said.