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SEOUL -- Thousands of South Koreans rallied in central Seoul Saturday to urge the Japanese government to build more storage facilities on land for nuclear-contaminated water instead of discharging it into the sea.

The civic activists gathered near the Seoul City Hall to clamor against Japan's planned discharge of radioactive wastewater, holding signs that read "Protect Pacific Ocean!" and "Storage on Land."

They also urged the South Korean government and people to prevent Japan's irresponsible plan of discharging nuke-contaminated water into the sea.

The organizer said that as the time for Japan's plan of dumping radioactive wastewater approaches, concerns are growing in South Korea and abroad, while evidence abounds that the release has adverse effects on the ecosystem.

Kwon Min-kyung, a Seoul citizen who joined the protest rally, told Xinhua that the Japanese government's decision to dump radioactive wastewater simply to save money is a criminal act of destroying the marine ecosystem, even though there is a way to store it on land.

Despite grave concerns expressed by neighbors and the Pacific island countries, the Japanese government has decided to release radioactive wastewater from the crippled nuclear power plant in Fukushima into the Pacific Ocean "in spring or summer."