Home Office proposes minimum income threshold for those wishing to bring a spouse, partner or dependents to the country British citizens who are poor or unemployed could be prevented from marrying the spouse of their choice if new family migration proposals become law. The government wants to introduce a new minimum income threshold for those looking to sponsor a spouse, partner or dependants to come to the UK. Under the proposals the unemployed or those living on less than around £5,000 a year would be banned from doing so, while the probation period before spouses and partners can apply for settlement in Britain will be raised from two to five years. A Home Office consultation paper published on Wednesday also proposes making it more difficult for families to bring dependant grandparents to live with them in the UK. Instead, it encourages people to send money to support them abroad. The shake-up of the family migration route to Britain, under which 48,900 visas were granted last year, is the fourth phase of the government’s plan to curb immigration abuse and reduce net migration to below 100,000 a year. However, the Oxford University-based Migration Observatory estimates the plans contained in the paper would reduce annual net migration by no more than 8,000 per year. Restrictions on the number of non-European skilled workers and overseas students have already been announced, and there will a reduction in the rights of temporary workers who wish to settle in the UK. The immigration minister, Damian Green, said the proposals would encourage “better family migration” and were designed to end abuses and send a message that “if you can’t support your foreign spouse or partner, you cannot expect the taxpayer to do it for you”. The majority of those who come to Britain under the family route are women from Pakistan, India and Bangladesh. The consultation proposes tougher English language standards and a more ‘rigorous’ approach to sham marriages including a new test to establish whether relationships are genuine by investigating whether the couple live together, speak the same language and knew each other before getting married. Ministers also want to change the wording of article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights – which protects the right to family life – to allow even genuine wives and husbands to be deported if they had been living in the UK illegally. As revealed in the Guardian earlier this year, the consultation contains plans to scrap the right of appeal for visitor’s visas, which would end 40% of all immigration appeals. The family migration plan is expected to be implemented this autumn. Immigration and asylum Damian Green Alan Travis guardian.co.uk
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Home ministry confirms three terrorist attacks, two in south Mumbai, in the Opera House district and Zaveri bazaar and one in Dadar in central city 3.38pm: The blasts occurred about an hour ago. At least 60 people have been injured, according to the Maharashtra home secretary (Maharashtra is the state in which Mumbai lies). The Maharastra government is not describing the blasts as terrorist attacks at the moment but the home ministry in Delhi has unequivocally said that the explosions were acts of terrorism. Mumbai was of course the scene of 2008 terrorist attacks by gunmen, which killed 166 people. 3.28pm: Three explosions have rocked Mumbai during rush hour, in a series of coordinated terrorist attacks on the city, India’s home ministry said. There were no confirmed numbers of fatalities or injuries but NDTV quoted reports saying 10 people have been killed . Two of the explosions took place in the Opera House district in South Mumbai at Opera House and in Zaveri bazaar. A third occurred in Dadar in the centre of the city. Six people have died in the Dadar blast and four in the explosion at Zaveri Bazaar, according to NDTV. NDTV has rolling television coverage here. India Global terrorism Mumbai terror attacks Haroon Siddique guardian.co.uk
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The Federal Election Commission, which serves to govern the financing of federal elections, ended its second quarter for presidential fundraising on June 30. Of the Republican candidates who released their numbers, former Gov. Mitt Romney led the Republican presidential hopefuls with $18.3 million, trailed by Rep. Ron Paul with $4.5 million, former Gov. Tim Pawlenty with $4.2 million, and former ambassador and Gov. Jon Huntsman with $4.1 million. Earlier this morning, Obama 2012 campaign manager Jim Messina previewed President Barack Obama's fundraising numbers and placed his fundraising sum at $86 million, far overshadowing any of his GOP competitors. While the number appears ominous to his rivals, it isn't as staggering as it seems, and might even place Obama behind the mark of where he hopes to be. As National Review's Jim Geraghty explains , Obama's fundraising is actually behind his 2008 pace, and if he keeps the same pace for the remaining seven quarters, will not come close to achieving his goal of $1 billion. Check out more of Geraghty's analysis after the break, and let us know your thoughts in the comments. The first point Geraghty brings up is Obama's fundraising total is actually the sum of money raised by his campaign plus money raised for the Democratic National Committee. When the DNC dollars are subtracted out, Obama's campaign total falls to $47 million. Also, GOP contributions are split among a number of candidates instead of funneled behind one, and do not include RNC fundraising dollars. As Geraghty explains, Is Obama ahead in fundraising? Yes, and probably by quite a bit. But the comparison is not Obama and the DNC’s $86 million against Romney’s $18.3 million. The comparison is Obama and the DNC’s $86 million against Romney [or your preferred candidate] + $12 million for the RNC in April and May + the RNC’s June total. Will Obama still be comfortably ahead? Of course. And he probably should be, considering how he’s an incumbent president who has hit the fundraising trail with a fast and furious pace. Further, the money raised, even with DNC fundraising included, is not at par with his 2008 fundraising, much less his goal of $1 billion. But again, to match his $750 million from the 2008 cycle, Obama would need to average $107 million for seven quarters. Obviously, it is possible that Obama can make up ground in the next few quarters. But to hit that hyped $1 billion number, Obama would need to raise a bit more than $142 million per quarter. As impressive as the $86 million figure is, it’s below those markers. As Hot Air points out , the number also falls behind former President George W. Bush's third quarter fundraising, which raked in $49.5 million. What do you think the slowed fundraising pace means for Obama? Do you think it's a sign of trouble for his campaign, or just a sign of a weaker economy than 2008?
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Tehran fury at ‘internet in a suitcase’ prompts upgrade to web filtering system blocking forbidden websites Iran has stepped up online censorship by upgrading the filtering system that enables the Islamic regime to block access to thousands of websites it deems inappropriate for Iranian users. The move comes one month after the United States announced plans to launch new services facilitating internet access and mobile phone communications in countries with tight controls on freedom of speech, a decision that infuriated Tehran’s regime and prompted harsh reactions from several Iranian officials. The upgrade had at first appeared as a relaxation of the censorship machine. Iran’s online community said on Monday that filtering was temporarily lifted for the entire country, giving users access to banned websites such as Twitter and Facebook. But hopes for an end to censorship were dashed when news agencies reported later in the day that the respite was due to the process of making the upgrade. Despite the filtering, many Iranians access blocked addresses with help from proxy websites or virtual private network (VPN) services. The upgrade is aimed at stopping users bypassing censorship. More than 5 million websites are filtered in Iran. Media organisations including the Guardian, BBC and CNN are blocked, though access to the New York Times website is allowed. On Google, the Farsi equivalents for words such as “condom”, “sex”, “lesbian” and “anti-filtering” are filtered out. Iran is believed to be worried about the influence of the internet and especially social networking websites as pro-democracy activists across the Middle East use them to promote and publicise their movements. Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency quoted an unnamed official as saying: “The ministry of communications and information technology is strengthening the filtering system and recent disruptions were the result of this upgrade.” At the same time, Nasimonline.ir , an agency that publishes short Twitter-style bursts of news, said it had received information that “a new filtering system that targets Google and Yahoo search engines” had been installed and tested on Monday. “I think that the new upgrade in the filtering system is a signal from Iran that the regime is prepared to stop any attempt by the US to challenge the country’s online censorship,” said an Iranian who spoke to the Guardian by phone from Tehran on condition of anonymity. The New York Times reported last month that the Obama administration is leading a global effort to deploy what is known as “shadow internet” or “internet in a suitcase” by spending $2m (£1.25m) on secretive projects to create “independent cellphone networks inside foreign countries”. The aim is to provide services that allow “wireless communication over a wide area with a link to the global internet” in support of dissidents in countries that have tightened their grip on freedom of speech. In reaction to the US move, Iran’s intelligence minister, Heidar Moslehi, was quoted by Fars as saying: “We had predicted these actions, such as the internet in suitcase, and we have planned proper ways to combat them.” In an interview with the semi-official Mehr news agency, Iran’s minister for communications and information technology, Reza Taghipour, accused the US of “cyber terrorism” for its plans to launch “internet in suitcase”. In April, the Tehran government announced that it intended to launch “halal internet”, a country-wide intranet and a parallel network that conforms to Islamic values with the ultimate goal of substituting for the global internet. Iran’s opposition believe that Iran is buying its filtering technology from China. In September 2009 Iran’s powerful Revolutionary Guards, a body under the direct control of the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, purchased 51% of the Telecommunications Company of Iran, which monitors internet filtering in the country. Iran Internet United States Censorship Freedom of speech Saeed Kamali Dehghan guardian.co.uk
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BSkyB bid dropped by Rupert Murdoch’s media group after pressure from the public and parliament Rupert Murdoch’s media group News Corporation bowed to pressure from the public and parliament on Wednesday and withdrew its bid to take full control of pay-TV company BSkyB. All three main political parties were poised to call on News Corp to abandon its offer in a vote in the House of Commons later on Wednesday. The move leaves News Corp’s key strategy for UK corporate growth in tatters. The proposed £8bn deal has been in train for more than a year, with the first offer tabled in June 2010. It is the one of the biggest setbacks the 80-year-old media mogul has ever suffered and follows 10 days of revelations about the true scale of phone hacking at the News of the World, the paper Murdoch shut down last week. The decision to abandon the deal is also a major blow to James Murdoch, who is third in command at the company and has responsibility for News Corp’s UK businesses, including its Sky stake and News International. It is likely to lead to criticism from investors over the way the company has handled the phone-hacking affair. James Murdoch initially took charge of the scandal but his father has twice flown in to the UK to oversee matters, most recently at the weekend. News Corp’s deputy chairman and chief operating officer, Chase Carey, said it had become clear that the Sky takeover “is too difficult to progress in this climate”. Carey, who is also News Corp’s president, said: “We believed that the proposed acquisition of BSkyB by News Corporation would benefit both companies but it has become clear that it is too difficult to progress in this climate. “News Corporation remains a committed long-term shareholder in BSkyB. We are proud of the success it has achieved and our contribution to it.” News Corp will have to pay BSkyB a break fee of around £38.5m after walking away from the deal. BSkyB’s share price immediately began to fall. It was down by 23.5p, or 3.4%, to 669p at about 2.30pm on Wednesday, shortly after the announcement that the deal was off, far below the 700p level at which News Corp originally tabled a bid. More than £3bn has been wiped from the value of BSkyB shares since the Guardian revealed on Monday 4 July that News of the World journalists had hacked into a mobile phone belonging to murdered teenager Milly Dowler. The decision to walk away from the deal was taken earlier on Wednesday before prime minister’s questions, which was followed by an announcement by David Cameron about the details of two separate inquiries, one into phone hacking and the other into media standards. Carey was at News International’s Wapping offices on the fringes of the City of London briefly, where the decision is believed to have been finalised. Nick Clegg, the deputy prime minister, said withdrawing the bid was the “decent and sensible” thing do to. The Liberal Democrat leader briefly threatened to cause a coalition split when he declared Murdoch should abandon the Sky offer earlier this week, before Cameron decided he would also back a Labour motion to call for it to be dropped. The shadow culture secretary, Ivan Lewis, said: “It’s a victory for the public of this country, it’s a victory for parliament and it’s a victory for the tremendous leadership that Ed Miliband has shown.” • To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly “for publication”. • To get the latest media news to your desktop or mobile, follow MediaGuardian on Twitter and Facebook News Corporation Media business BSkyB Television industry BSkyB Rupert Murdoch Phone hacking Newspapers & magazines National newspapers Newspapers News of the World James Robinson guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …How sick are you over this never ending debt ceiling debate? The latest is coming from Mitch McConnell, who is proposing a deal that allows Republicans to vote no on raising the ceiling, then allows Obama to veto them and each time he must submit imaginary budget cuts. I say imaginary because it’s not a hard piece of legislation so Obama isn’t obligated to honor the cuts. Are you confused? Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Tuesday laid out a plan that puts the responsibility for increasing the debt limit squarely on President Obama. McConnell has called for Congress to pass legislation authorizing Obama to make successive requests to increase the debt limit. Under the legislation, Congress could only block those requests by passing resolutions of disapproval, which would have to be supported by two-thirds of both the Senate and House to overcome an expected presidential veto. McConnell described his proposal as a “last choice option” to avoid a national default if Congress fails to otherwise agree to a compromise to raise the debt limit by Aug. 2, when the Treasury Department has warned it will run out of money to pay U.S. debts. It would send a clear signal to the markets and the public that the nation will not default on its debt, which would boost interest rates and make mortgages, auto loans, credit cards and student loans more expensive. Duncan writes: I don’t think it matters if they force Obama to come up with spending cut proposals that won’t go anywhere. He can just turn the whole thing into a farce, and do things like proposing to zero out the defense budget in year 10 or other things which obviously won’t happen. Kevin Drum explains it a little more and is mystified . Obama has been screaming that we have to raise the debt ceiling as well as many economists and Wall Streeters so it’s not like it’ll be a shock to America if they make him repeatedly have to ask for it, but it appears McConnell feels that they can keep the debt ceiling in our political discourse throughout the election cycle and it will aid them. Or, he’s looking at internal polling and not liking what he sees. I don’t want a Grand Bargain even though it’s apparent that the president does, but is this the only way for there to be a clean vote on the ceiling after all? Digby writes: The deal is certainly preferable on policy grounds to gutting Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid in a Grand Bargain. But it isn’t clean and it isn’t free. It feels like the death by a thousand cuts instead. On the other hand, Arthur Delaney just tweeted that they may throw in some extended unemployment to make the medicine go down, so that’s good. Creating jobs would be better, but that’s highly unlikely under this austerity so this is the next best thing. Update: According to dday , these spending cuts are hypothetical: Based on this summary from McConnell’s office, it appears that the President would have to write down a plan for spending cuts right away, but they would not be enacted alongside an increase in the debt limit. They would be hypothetical. Rich Lowry says the House reaction is dim to this proposal. If McConnell’s plan could make it through without required spending cuts then it would essentially be a series of clean votes, albeit clumsy, confused and byzantine. And that’s a good thing! No wonder the wingnuts are going batshit. (I wonder how the White House sees it.) Red State is one of the wingers going batshit crazy over this move by McConnell: Mitch McConnell Just Proposed the “Pontius Pilate Pass the Buck Act of 2011″ Mitch McConnell is right now talking about making a historic capitulation. So fearful of being blamed for a default, McConnell is proposing a compromise that lets Barack Obama raise the debt ceiling without making any spending cuts at all.. {} UPDATE: Some of the most willfully ignorant and willfully naive McConnell supporters are coming out of the woodwork to say this is not *the* plan, but a contingency plan if *the* plan can’t be agreed to. So let’s get this straight: if Democrats won’t agree to make spending cuts, we’ll fall back to the contingency where they get to raise the debt ceiling without making spending cuts. That’s not a contingency, that’s handing the Democrats a silver platter. The Tea Party basically wants to not raise the debt ceiling so that they can cut 40% of government spending in one fell swoop. Just think about what would happen to the country if that happened? It’s Grover’s wet dream come true. Jonathan Cohn is excellent on policy and he’s finally very worried about the reality of a possible Grand Bargain taking place: Hello? President Obama? It’s the Department of WTF Calling. So what would Obama get in return? It’s hard to know for sure, given the scattered reports from the leaks. But the pattern certainly isn’t encouraging. As Ezra Klein notes in this morning’s “Wonkbook,” Obama has also offered to adjust the benefit formula for Social Security, so that it pays less in the future. In exchange for these and other concessions, Republicans have shown themselves willing to give up … nothing. Obama keeps saying he wants a “balanced” approach and “shared sacrifice,” in which some changes like these may belong. But, except for a brief moment when House Speaker John Boehner made the mistake of trying to act like a statesman, the Republicans have made clear they want no part of such a deal. (And, yes, by risking the U.S. economy, as well as the world’s, they are acting like terrorists do. But negotiating with terrorists is never a good idea.) A lot of my friends think the administration’s approach to these talks reflects a crass political calculation: That positioning the president as a mediator between the parties will boost his reelection prospects. I assume there’s some truth to that: Today’s New York Times story on Obama’s centrist bona fides doesn’t look like the kind that materialized out of thin air. But I also see other motives at work. In particular, I think Obama wants to be the president who makes big, transformative accomplishments—he wants to be the president who does what everybody says can’t be done. And right now a major deficit reduction deal is what everybody says can’t be done. It’s an admirable quality, in most respects. But news like yesterday’s makes me worry that Obama’s desire to produce a deal may be blinding him to what’s in it.
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Click here to view this media Some good news tonight from Wisconsin. All six of the fake Democrats the GOP put up to run against actual Democrats in the recall primary elections lost tonight. I wonder if this will cause any backlash for them wasting the taxpayers’ money for pulling this stunt. Ed Schultz talked to the Nation’s John Nichols about the results and here’s more from USA Today — Fake Democrats lose in Wisconsin primary recalls . And as Ed and John discussed, the GOP running fake Democrats weren’t the only dirty tricks that went on with these elections. Deceitful Robocalls Added to List of Dirty Election Tricks in Wisconsin : Adding to the list of dirty tricks, reports are surfacing that a “Right to Life” group is robocalling Wisconsin Democrats and telling them not to go to the polls today, and instead to wait for an absentee ballot to arrive in the mail. This is false, as July 12 is the last day to cast a vote in the Democratic primary, and there is not enough time to cast a vote by mail. Apparently, the robocalls are coming from a 703 area code (Virginia). We do not know yet exactly who is ultimately responsible for these calls, and even if an individual is caught and takes the fall, we may never find out who’s really pulling the strings. Whoever they are, they are obviously people in synch with the right wing agenda of Governor Walker and the Koch Brothers. Disenfranchising voters by tricking them into not voting is a tried and true method of voter suppression. So is finding excuses at the polling place to keep certain people from voting, as GOP-pushed voter ID laws do. What all the tactics we see in Wisconsin have in common is that the right wing is pulling out the stops to prevent the people from exercising their constitutional right to remove them from office. Karoli : Fortunately, Wisconsin’s recall elections will go forward with actual Democrats running against their recall targets. Despite the best efforts of Koch Industries and their American Majority puppets , the real Dems won by large margins. Daily Kos : 8:01 PM PT (Steve Singiser): To put our own shiny bow on Wisconsin, here are the margins of victory for each of the real Dems: Nancy Nusbaum (SD-02) wins 65-35; Sandy Pasch (SD-08) wins 67-33; Shelly Moore (SD-10) wins 54-46; Fred Clark (SD-14) wins 67-33; Jessica King (SD-18) wins 69-31; Jennifer Shilling (SD-32) wins 71-29. Of course, it means the Republicans get another 30 days before they lose, but at least the fakers were sent home summarily. Next up: Republican attempts to recall Democrats on July 19th. Because the two parties really are not alike at all, there will be real Republicans facing real Republicans in a couple of the primaries, as opposed to fake ones screwing up the landscape. However, that doesn’t mean the races won’t be interesting .
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Speakers praise Betty Ford for her warmth and honesty at her funeral in California US first ladies past and present have joined other former White House residents to remember Betty Ford at her funeral. Speakers hailed Ford for reshaping the role of first lady with her plain-spoken candour and as an inspiration for the addiction rehabilitation centres that bear her name. “Millions of women are in her debt today and she was never afraid to speak the truth even about the most sensitive subjects, including her own struggle with alcohol and painkillers,” said Rosalynn Carter, who succeeded her in the White House. “She got some criticism, but I thought she was wonderful and her honesty gave to others every single day.” Michelle Obama, Nancy Reagan, Hillary Clinton and former president George Bush were among those at the service in Palm Desert, California. Ford, who died aged 93 on Friday , helped bring previously taboo subjects such as breast cancer into public discussion and openly discussed her own battle with the disease. She was equally candid about her struggles with drug and alcohol abuse, and spearheaded the Betty Ford Centre to treat those addictions. Cokie Roberts, a TV interviewer, noted that Gerald Ford confided to her privately that his wife badgered him relentlessly into stronger public support of equal rights for women. Bush, accompanied by Nancy Reagan, arrived a few minutes before Michelle Obama. The former president chatted quietly with Reagan as they waited for the services to begin, greeting Clinton as she took a seat next to him. After the funeral, members of the public were invited to file past the casket and sign a guest book. Ford’s body will be flown on Wednesday to Grand Rapids, Michigan, where Lynne Cheney, wife of the former US vice-president Dick Cheney, and historian Richard Norton Smith will speak at a church service. The former first lady Barbara Bush is expected to attend that event. Ford will be buried alongside her husband at Gerald Ford’s presidential museum in Grand Rapids on Thursday, which would have been his 98th birthday. Ford, the accidental first lady, was thrust into the White House when Richard Nixon resigned as US president over the Watergate scandal and Gerald Ford, then vice-president, assumed the US’s highest office. Rosalynn Carter recalled that she met Ford when the first lady visited Georgia, where Carter’s husband was governor. “We invited Betty to stay at the governor’s mansion. She was the most distinguished guest we had ever had but when she arrived she was so warm and friendly that she immediately put me at ease and we had a good time together. “Of course I didn’t tell her then that my husband was thinking of running for president,” Carter added. A lifelong friendship remained intact after Gerald Ford lost his re-election bid to Jimmy Carter. Outside the church passersby, some walking dogs or out for a jog, stopped to reflect on the former first lady’s life. “I don’t know where a lot of people would be if it weren’t for her,” said Randy Gaynor, 47, a recovering alcoholic. “There’s been a lot of first ladies and they did a lot of things, but this will be long remembered after she’s gone.” United States US politics guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Speakers praise Betty Ford for her warmth and honesty at her funeral in California US first ladies past and present have joined other former White House residents to remember Betty Ford at her funeral. Speakers hailed Ford for reshaping the role of first lady with her plain-spoken candour and as an inspiration for the addiction rehabilitation centres that bear her name. “Millions of women are in her debt today and she was never afraid to speak the truth even about the most sensitive subjects, including her own struggle with alcohol and painkillers,” said Rosalynn Carter, who succeeded her in the White House. “She got some criticism, but I thought she was wonderful and her honesty gave to others every single day.” Michelle Obama, Nancy Reagan, Hillary Clinton and former president George Bush were among those at the service in Palm Desert, California. Ford, who died aged 93 on Friday , helped bring previously taboo subjects such as breast cancer into public discussion and openly discussed her own battle with the disease. She was equally candid about her struggles with drug and alcohol abuse, and spearheaded the Betty Ford Centre to treat those addictions. Cokie Roberts, a TV interviewer, noted that Gerald Ford confided to her privately that his wife badgered him relentlessly into stronger public support of equal rights for women. Bush, accompanied by Nancy Reagan, arrived a few minutes before Michelle Obama. The former president chatted quietly with Reagan as they waited for the services to begin, greeting Clinton as she took a seat next to him. After the funeral, members of the public were invited to file past the casket and sign a guest book. Ford’s body will be flown on Wednesday to Grand Rapids, Michigan, where Lynne Cheney, wife of the former US vice-president Dick Cheney, and historian Richard Norton Smith will speak at a church service. The former first lady Barbara Bush is expected to attend that event. Ford will be buried alongside her husband at Gerald Ford’s presidential museum in Grand Rapids on Thursday, which would have been his 98th birthday. Ford, the accidental first lady, was thrust into the White House when Richard Nixon resigned as US president over the Watergate scandal and Gerald Ford, then vice-president, assumed the US’s highest office. Rosalynn Carter recalled that she met Ford when the first lady visited Georgia, where Carter’s husband was governor. “We invited Betty to stay at the governor’s mansion. She was the most distinguished guest we had ever had but when she arrived she was so warm and friendly that she immediately put me at ease and we had a good time together. “Of course I didn’t tell her then that my husband was thinking of running for president,” Carter added. A lifelong friendship remained intact after Gerald Ford lost his re-election bid to Jimmy Carter. Outside the church passersby, some walking dogs or out for a jog, stopped to reflect on the former first lady’s life. “I don’t know where a lot of people would be if it weren’t for her,” said Randy Gaynor, 47, a recovering alcoholic. “There’s been a lot of first ladies and they did a lot of things, but this will be long remembered after she’s gone.” United States US politics guardian.co.uk
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Naoto Kan says Fukushima crisis has convinced him to aim for a society not dependent on nuclear power Prime minister Naoto Kan said on Wednesday the Fukushima nuclear crisis had convinced him that Japan should aim at a society that does not depend on nuclear energy and eventually has no atomic plants. The unpopular leader denied he was considering calling a snap election over energy policy and sidestepped a question on when he would keep a promise to step down, saying he wanted to do his best to work on nuclear policy and rebuild the country from the devastating 11 March earthquake and tsunami that triggered the world’s worst nuclear crisis in 25 years. “Given the enormity of the risks associated with nuclear power generation, I have realised nuclear technology is not something that can be managed by conventional safety measures alone,” Kan told a news conference. “I believe we should aim for a society that is not dependent on nuclear power generation.” He said it was premature to set a timeframe for achieving that goal. Kan also said Japan would be able to avoid summer and winter power shortages because of energy conservation efforts and companies’ in-house power supplies, despite the large number of reactors now offline for inspections or other work. The unpopular prime minister has become increasingly sensitive to growing public concern about nuclear power, but whether he oversees an overhaul of energy policy is in doubt since he has promised to resign, although he has not said when. Nuclear energy accounted for about 30% of Japan’s power supply before the 11 March disasters crippled Tokyo Electric Power Co’s Fukushima plant 240km (150 miles) north of the capital. That ratio slipped to 18% in June. Nuclear power Energy Japan disaster Japan guardian.co.uk
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