IAEA team to inspect Fukushima next week

The UN atomic agency announced Tuesday a visit to Japan's crippled Fukushima nuclear plant to review efforts to plan and implement its decommissioning, two years after a major disaster there.

The April 15-22 trip by the 12-member team of International Atomic Energy (IAEA) nuclear experts and international specialists is at the request of the Japanese government, a statement said.

"The review is expected to be the first of a two-mission programme to provide IAEA support for Japan's decommissioning of the damaged reactors at Fukushima Daiichi," it said.

In March 2011, a devastating earthquake and tsunami killed thousands of people and sent multiple reactors at the decades-old Fukushima nuclear plant into meltdown, spewing radiation over a wide area in the world's worst atomic disaster in 25 years.