Prime Minister Shinzo Abe vowed Monday to accelerate Fukushima's recovery from one of the world's worst nuclear crises as he received a ruling bloc proposal for greater government involvement and use of taxpayer money to this end.
The government is thus expected to spend more public funds to cover the cleanup of radiation-contaminated areas outside the stricken Fukushima No. 1 nuclear complex — costs that Tokyo Electric Power Co. otherwise would have had to shoulder.
To carry out the unprecedented task of scrapping reactors that suffered meltdowns, the proposal also touches on the need for the giant utility to have "a clearer organizational structure," including a new in-house company to take charge of decommissioning operations.