Japan to ease evacuation orders around nuclear plant

The Japanese government was on Friday to lift its advisory to evacuate areas between 20 and 30 kilometers from a damaged atomic power plant, news reports said, dpa reported. The decision was to be formalized at a ministerial conference on the nuclear crisis later in the day, Kyodo News reported, citing unnamed government officials. Most of the 59,000 residents living in the affected areas around the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, 250 kilometres north-east of Tokyo, have left their home since the advisory was issued on April 22. Since the plant was hit by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, it has been leaking radioactive material into the environment. The exclusion zone within 20 kilometres of the plant, imposed in late April, was to remain a no-go area.Japan to ease evacuation orders around nuclear plant