Strong quake hits Niigata

   A strong earthquake registering a magnitude at 6.8 on the Richter scale occurred off Kashiwazaki City in Niigata Prefecture at 10:13 a.m. on July 16, killing at least nine people.

   In Kashiwazaki and two other municipalities in the prefecture as well as part of neighboring Nagano Prefecture, a tremor of 6-plus on the Japanese scale of zero to seven was recorded.

   As of July 17, one person was still missing, 1,119 injured, 1,313 houses damaged, and 12,000 residents evacuated.

   The Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Nuclear Power Plant located in the area was shaken far more severely than thought possible at the time of its design, and all four reactors in operation suffered emergency shut-downs. A fire broke out at a transformer in the plant that took two hours to extinguish.

JCP establishes taskforce

   The Japanese Communist Party immediately established a taskforce led by Secretariat Head Ichida Tadayoshi, and sent Vice-Chair Ogata Yasuo and House of Councilors member Yoshikawa Haruko to the disaster areas to provide quake victims with emergency relief in cooperation with local JCP organizations.

   Ogata and Yoshikawa together with local JCP officials visited evacuation centers and areas where houses were destroyed to determine the immediate needs of residents.                                   - Akahata, July 17, 2007