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Japan OKs package for shaky buildings
(AP)
Updated: 2005-12-06 17:14
Japan's Cabinet approved measures Tuesday to demolish buildings designed
using falsified earthquake safety data and to relocate residents amid a widening
construction scandal.
The package covers the demolition of the defective buildings, provides public
housing for displaced residents and allows them to postpone loan payments for
the destroyed units.
"Our main goal right now is to guarantee the safety of the people living in
these buildings," Land, Infrastructure and Transport Minister Kazuo Kitagawa
told reporters.
The government will spend $66 million on the package, the Nihon Keizai
newspaper reported earlier Tuesday.
Kitagawa said the government would demand compensation from companies
involved in the construction and sale of faulty buildings. It will also set up a
center to handle inquiries from citizens worried about building safety, help
cities pay for building inspections, and audit architectural safety agencies
accused of approving the flawed construction plans.
So far, the ministry has confirmed that 57 defective buildings 錕斤拷 the majority
of them hotels 錕斤拷 are at risk of collapsing in a moderately strong earthquake.
On Monday, the ministry filed a criminal complaint against architect
Hidetsugu Aneha, who admitted to violating quake safety regulations to cut costs
on at least 21 of the faulty buildings. The ministry also reportedly planned to
file criminal charges against builders who worked with Aneha.
"We need to pursue their civil and criminal responsibility for this problem,"
Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe said.
The residents whose buildings are earmarked for demolition stand to lose at
least $116 million, the ministry has said.
The scandal has sparked safety concerns and outrage in Japan, one of the
world's most earthquake-prone countries. The government has upgraded building
standards since a magnitude-7.2 quake killed more than 6,400 people in the
western port city of Kobe in 1995.
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