Japan mourns on quake anniversary

By IANS/RIA Novosti,

Tokyo : Japan Sunday marked the first anniversary of the devastating 9 magnitude earthquake and tsunami which killed almost 15,000 people.


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The disaster claimed at least 14,919 lives and triggered a number of explosions at the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant, causing a partial meltdown at three of its reactors. Another 4,000 were missing.

Radiation leaked into the atmosphere, soil and seawater, becoming the world’s worst nuclear disaster after Chernobyl in 1986.

A mourning ceremony held in Tokyo was attended by Japanese Emperor Akihito, who recently underwent heart surgery.

One minutes’s silence was observed at 14.46 p.m. (6.46 a.m. GMT) – the exact time the quake struck – throughout Japan.

Flowers were planted in the quake-hit areas, Miyagi, Fukushima and Iwate.

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