By Xinhua,
Tokyo : The U.S. Navy’s nuclear-powered submarine Houston has leaked radioactive water at another two ports in Japan beside at the previously reported Sasebo port in March, the Japanese Foreign Ministry announced Thursday.
The ministry said it was notified by the U.S. embassy in Japan in the afternoon. The U.S. side said the Houston, a U.S. Navy Los Angeles-class fast attack submarine, had been making a steady leakage from June 2006 until last month.
During the period, beside making five port calls in southern Japan’s Sasebo, the submarine made another one port call in Yokosuka south of Tokyo and another five in Uruma of southernmost Japan’s Okinawa Prefecture.
The U.S. embassy said the accumulative amount of leakage water containing trace of radiation was “extremely small” and posed no risk to public health or the environment.
Japan was first notified of the leakage at Sasebo port on Saturday. The news aroused widespread discontent in the country.