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Beijing, May 23: : Fifteen radiation "sources" are still inaccessible in the earthquake-ravaged southwest China, but no signs of leaks have been detected in nuclear facilities, a top official said on Friday.
Experts have identified 50 radiation sources and moved 35 of them to safe areas so far, Vice Minister of Environmental Protection Wu Xiaoqing said, 11 days after the magnitude 8 quake struck, causing large scale devastation in Sichuan province.
The region has some key atomic sites and the country's chief nuclear weapons research lab.
Shortly after the quake, China had said it had activated its contingency plans for nuclear and radiation pollution as a precautionary step.
The local Environmental Protection Bureaus were also issued an "urgent notice" to closely monitor the status of nuclear facilities and ensure a hundred per cent nuclear and radiation safety, the Ministry of Environmental Protection had said earlier.
Wu said three of the remaining 15 sources were buried under the rubble while 12 were in "dangerous buildings" that technicians could not enter.
"We have asked local government to inform us when they plan to clean the rubble," he was quoted as saying by state-run Xinhua news agency.
He also said, "We did not find any radioactive substantive leaks into the environment".
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