Nearly three-quarters of Japanese companies support abandoning nuclear power after last year's Fukushima disaster, although a majority set the condition that alternative energy resources must be secured, a Reuters poll showed on Friday.

The poll offers fresh evidence of the deep public distrust of nuclear power, the role of which the government is reconsidering after the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami that wrecked the Fukushima nuclear plant, triggering a radiation crisis that caused mass evacuations and widespread contamination.

Talks between Iran and six world powers on its disputed nuclear program failed to produce a breakthrough on Thursday, in an apparent diplomatic setback for both sides.

The six wanted a freeze on Iranian production of uranium enriched to 20 percent purity, which is considered a short step from bomb grade. The Iranians wanted an easing of the onerous economic sanctions imposed by the West and recognition of what they call their right to enrich.

The radiation released in the first days of the Fukushima nuclear disaster was almost 2-1/2 times the amount first estimated by Japanese safety regulators, the operator of the crippled plant said in a report released on Thursday.

Tokyo Electric Power said its own analysis conducted over the past year put the amount of radiation released in the first three weeks of the accident at about one-sixth the radiation released during the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.

Germany has asked for discussion on deeper EU carbon emissions cuts to be put on the agenda at a meeting of environment ministers in June, EU sources said.

If agreed, a more ambitious target could help to spur the European Union's carbon market, which has sunk to record lows.

Previous debate of bigger carbon cuts, however, has been difficult, with coal-reliant Poland objecting that they could damage its economy.

Spikes in radiation caused by the Fukushima nuclear disaster were below cancer-causing levels in almost all of Japan, but infants in one town appear to be at a higher risk of developing thyroid cancer, the World Health Organization said on Wednesday.

In a preliminary report, independent experts said that people in two locations in Fukushima Prefecture may have received a radiation dose of 10-50 millisieverts (mSv) in the year after the accident at the power station operated by TEPCO.

Latest satellite imagery shows that a fourth reactor at Pakistan’s Khushab nuclear facility, which is dedicated to production of plutonium for weapons, is halfway through. A new paper on the status of the facility, which is located 200 km south of Islamabad and is not under IAEA scrutiny, by the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) claims the fourth reactor will significantly increase Pakistan’s ability to make plutonium.

The draft energy bill plans major changes to the market, causing concern that consumers' bills could rise and renewable energy is being neglected

The biggest reforms to the UK energy sector in two decades were set out on Tuesday, prompting warnings from consumer groups and green campaigners that they would raise bills and penalise renewable energy while boosting nuclear power.

The sweeping reforms, detailed in the draft energy bill, grant the government powers to intervene in the market on a scale not seen since the industry was privatised.

Radiation doses received after the Fukushima nuclear accident last year were below international reference levels in all but two locations in Japan and below the level seen as "very small" in neighbouring countries, the World Health Organization said on Wednesday.

The preliminary report by independent experts found that, using conservative assumptions, people in two locations of relatively high exposure in Fukushima prefecture may have received a dose of 10-50 millisieverts (mSv) in the year after the accident at the power station operated by TEPCO.

The Cabinet on Thursday approved the draft of the 'Bangladesh Atomic Energy Control Act, 2012' with provisions for constituting a separate regulator for the country's first-ever nuclear power plant at Rooppur, Pabna.
The approval was given at the weekly meeting of the cabinet held at the Bangladesh Secretariat with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in the chair.

Britain's ageing nuclear reactors, which were due to close in the next decade, are set to be kept open under a plan approved by the industry's regulator.

In a move that could have far-reaching implications for the government's energy policy, the Office for Nuclear Regulation has told the Guardian it is working with the country's dominant nuclear operator, the French-owned company EDF, to extend the life of its eight nuclear power stations in the UK, and that it is "content for the plants to continue to operate", as long as they pass regular safety tests.