China voices concern over impact of Fukushima nuclear leak

China has been closely following the consequences of the Fukushima nuclear power station disaster and hopes that Japan will fully inform the global community of the latest and most accurate updates, the Foreign Ministry said on Friday.

"We hope the Japanese act in a highly responsible manner, for the people of Japan and neighboring countries, as well as the international community," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told a press briefing.

The remarks came after Hua was asked about the Tokyo Electric Power Company's acknowledgment on Monday that its insistence on simply calling the disaster a "nuclear reactor damage" may have underplayed its severity.

An explosion at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in 2011, following a powerful earthquake, destroyed a building that was holding a reactor and sparked fears that it could go into meltdown.

China has, on a number of occasions, asked the Japanese government to fully tackle the follow-up issues, the spokeswoman said.

Faced with questions about the possible consequences, Japan has explicitly denied it was deliberately downplaying or concealing any facts.

However, facts proved that the "reactor melting" in the aftermath was far more than the vaguely-worded "damage", Hua said

Toshihide Tsuda, professor of environmental epidemiology at Japan's Okayama University, found that the incidence of thyroid cancer among children living near the plant, who have been exposed to leaked radioactive substances, was 20 to 50 times higher than the national average.

Over 80 percent of the leaked radioactive substances entered the sea, according to Ken Buesseler, marine radiochemist with the US Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.

Other scientists in North America also found that radioactive cesium coming from Fukushima had found its way to the US West Coast, having a serious impact on the fish, the ecosystem, and food safety.

Da Zhigang, director of the institute of northeast Asian studies at Heilongjiang Academy of Social Sciences, said the nuclear accident was by no means Japan's concern alone.

"Facts should not be hidden," Da said, adding it is also necessary for the global community to work together to address the situation.

Lyu Yaodong, an expert on Japanese policies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said Japan did not take into consideration the full environmental factors by playing a "hide-and-seek" game.

"Instead, it tried covering up the facts of the nuclear pollution with other excuses, such as asking for other countries to cancel import restrictions on its agricultural products," Lyu said.

Hua also alerted Chinese tourists to be cautious when travelling near Fukushima.

The Chinese contributed 4.99 million trips to Japan last year, more than double from the previous year's figure.

Xinhua contributed to this story.