Toxic water leak at Japanese plant

A total of 32 litres of toxic water has likely leaked from a tank at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station in Japan.

Highly radioactive water has leaked from a waste water tank at Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant, five years after the plant was crippled by an earthquake and tsunami.

A total of 32 litres of toxic water had likely leaked from a seam of the tank at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, broadcaster NHK reported, citing the operator Tokyo Electric Power.

The toxic water had mixed with rainwater on the ground and remained around the tank, the report said. Workers were moving waste water from the tank to another to lower the water level and stop the leak.

Since the March 2011 disaster, when the plant suffered meltdowns at three of its six reactors, the operator has been injecting water into the reactors to keep them cool and more than 1,000 storage tanks have been built to contain the radiation-contaminated water.

But leaks have been a continuous problem, with some of the highly toxic water even in the past flowing into the Pacific Ocean.

In 2013, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe helped Tokyo win its bid to host the 2020 Olympics by declaring that the situation at the nuclear plant was under control.