China calls for strict, long-term international supervision over Fukushima wastewater discharge: spokesman

China calls for strict and long-term international supervision over Japan's discharge of nuclear-contaminated wastewater from the crippled Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant into the ocean, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said on Wednesday.

Guo made the statement at a press conference in Beijing in response to a media query about Japan's wastewater discharge.

"I would like to emphasize that China opposes Japan's unilateral discharge of nuclear-contaminated wastewater into the ocean, and this position remains unchanged. Since last year, Chinese experts have visited Japan twice to independently collect samples and announced the relevant test results in a timely manner. On the basis that Japan has fulfilled its commitments and the test results haven't shown any abnormalities, the General Administration of Customs of China held in Beijing on March 12 technical exchanges with Japan over the safety of Japanese aquatic products," Guo said.

"China will continue to work with the rest of the international community to urge Japan to earnestly fulfill its commitments and ensure that the discharge of Fukushima nuclear-contaminated wastewater into the sea is always under strict international supervision," said the spokesman.

Hit by a magnitude-9.0 earthquake and an ensuing tsunami on March 11, 2011, the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant suffered core meltdowns in three reactors that released radiation, resulting in a level-7 nuclear accident, the highest on the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale.

The plant then generated a massive amount of wastewater tainted with radioactive substances from cooling down the nuclear fuel in the reactor buildings.

Disregarding domestic and foreign questioning and protests, the Japanese government decided in April 2021 to "filter and dilute" the nuclear contaminated wastewater from the plant and started the ocean discharge of the radioactive wastewater on August 24, 2023. This process is expected to last 20 to 30 years, until the nuclear power plant is scrapped.

China calls for strict, long-term international supervision over Fukushima wastewater discharge: spokesman

The Mecca Joint Defense Agreement, a newly formed defense pact among Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Türkiye, represents a deterrence strategy rather than an actual threat to Iran, according to Hossein Kanani Moghaddam, a former commander of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

The three nations on Friday signed the joint defense agreement in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, to deepen cooperation among the three regional powers amid rising regional security concerns, according to Pakistan's Foreign Ministry.

The agreement aims to strengthen collective deterrence against any act of aggression, under which an armed attack against any one of the three states shall be regarded as an attack against all, the ministry said in a statement.

However, its signing amid the backdrop of the Middle East conflict has prompted questions as to whether the parties would actually uphold their obligations in the event of a real attack.

"Treaties like these are more about deterrence than operational use. That is, if we were to attack the U.S. base in Saudi Arabia tomorrow, Pakistan wouldn't react. Even Türkiye, because they know that if they respond they'd be drawn into a war against Iran, is mostly engaging in propaganda. And in my view, it has no effect in terms of threatening Iran," said Kanani Moghaddam, who now works as a military analyst.

"We want to attack the U.S. base; we're not attacking Saudi Arabia. This base is in Saudi Arabia, and in any case Saudi Arabia understands that we're not seeking war with them. It seems that this pact that has been forged will have no effect on the war between Iran, the United States, and the Zionist regime; it is viewed more as a deterrent measure," he said.

Former IRGC commander plays down threat from Pakistan-Saudi-Türkiye defense pact