LOC15:33
12:33 GMT
PARIS, March 18 (KUNA) -- French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Friday
offered more assistance to Japan to help with the looming nuclear catastrophe
in that country, officials said.
In a telephone conversation with Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan, the
French leader said that he wanted to express solidarity with Japan's plight
after part of that country was ravaged by a 9.0 Richter-scale earthquake on
March 11 and by a massive Tsunami that devastated large broad sections of the
east coast, including the Fukushima nuclear power plant.
Reactors of at the plant are currently overheating because the system for
cooling them was badly damaged.
Experts say here that Japan has had a level 6 nuclear accident, which is
only one level below the worst possible scenario. By comparison, the 1985
meltdown in Chernobyl, Ukraine was a seven on the nuclear accident scale.
Sarkozy recalled to Kan France's "cooperation already undertaken...for the
benefit of Japan in matters of aid and protection of populations, as well as
to face up to the situation at the Fukushima and he stressed the full
availability of France to supply additional means" to Japan to help with the
nuclear challenge.
The French President also said he would go to Japan "as soon as
circumstances permit" to express the support of the Group of Eight (G8) and
the Group of 20, which France currently presides.
The visit would aim "to bring necessary aid for the reconstruction of
disaster areas and the economy of Japan". (End)
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KUNA 181533 Mar 11NNNN