PENZA — Prime Minister Vladimir Putin criticized Japan on Saturday for its "slow" reaction to its nuclear disaster and for building nuclear reactors in earthquake-prone zones.
Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear reactor complex was hit by a massive earthquake and tsunami on March 11, touching off the world's worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl in 1986.
Putin said Japan should have promptly brought electricity storage devices such as batteries and accumulators to the complex to help pump in water to cool stricken reactors.
"But … they didn't manage to do that on time, and then problems erupted," Putin said, speaking at a nuclear industry meeting in the city of Penza.
Putin also questioned Japan's decision to build nuclear power stations in areas vulnerable to earthquakes.
(Reuters)
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