00:00 There are thousands of dead fish washing up on the Japanese coast following the release
00:04 of the waste water from the Fukushima nuclear power plant.
00:08 That's what one video shared in Chinese and Korean claims.
00:11 Let's get down to the truth behind this clip.
00:19 It's a video that's been shared hundreds of thousands of times on social media, especially
00:23 by Chinese and South Korean users.
00:26 It alleges that thousands of dead fish are floating in the waters near a beach after
00:30 Tokyo started releasing waste water from the Fukushima nuclear power plant on the 24th
00:36 of August.
00:37 An earthquake followed by a tsunami in 2011 damaged the Fukushima nuclear power plant,
01:04 contaminating water within the facility with highly radioactive material.
01:09 Since the disaster, the company running the power plant, TEPCO, has been pumping in water
01:13 to cool down the reactors.
01:15 This means every day the plant produces contaminated water, enough to fill more than 500 Olympic
01:21 swimming pools.
01:23 And that storage space is about to run out, according to the country's authorities.
01:28 And leaving them no choice, they say, other than to begin getting rid of the waste water
01:33 into the Pacific Ocean.
01:34 The release of the treated waste water prompted heavy criticism and panic from Japan's neighbors.
01:40 China banned all Japanese seafood imports recently.
01:43 And fears over radioactive contamination have prompted panic buying and boycotts of seafood
01:49 in several cities in China and South Korea.
01:52 By doing a reverse image search, we found the original video on Douyin, the Chinese
01:56 equivalent of TikTok.
01:57 It was posted on the 7th of February, 2023, more than six months before Japan even started
02:03 to release the waste water.
02:05 AFP managed to geolocate where the scene was filmed exactly.
02:10 It was shot on a beach near the Tsutsuishi Fishing Port in Otagawa City.
02:15 The city is located on the west side of Japan, so on the opposite coast of the nuclear power
02:20 plant and it's over 280 kilometers away.
02:24 A local official told AFP that about 250 tons of dead fish were found, but that the cause
02:29 of the death remains unclear.
02:31 For more fact checks and investigations, check out our website, yournews.com.
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