The US has flagged Indonesian exports of footwear for cesium-137 contamination, adding another product showing signs of radiation to a list that already includes shrimp and cloves.
Authorities in Jakarta said Wednesday that two containers of footwear suspected of being contaminated with radioactive cesium-137 were recently returned by the US. Indonesia’s national research agency will carry out tests on the shoes, Bara Krishna Hasibuan, an official with the government task force investigating the radiation findings, told reporters.
The footwear comes from a company located near the site of a radiation leak in western Java, he said, adding that the first container arrived in Indonesia a month ago.
Authorities have been working for weeks to clean up an industrial park where they say a small steel company appears to have smelted scrap metal mixed with cesium, with resulting airborne particles contaminating nearby factories. The US previously flagged Indonesian exports of shrimp sent from a company within the industrial park.
Hasibuan said Wednesday that affected factories had undergone decontamination and have all been declared fit to resume normal operations.
“There are many lessons to be learned,” he said. Officials are tightening distribution controls and taking precautionary measures, he added, without elaborating.
(Reporting by Chandra Asmara. With assistance from Norman Harsono.)
Disclaimer: This report is auto generated from the Bloomberg news service. ThePrint holds no responsibility for its content.
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