The figurative “nuclear button” war between the US and North Korea is a sad story of the nuclear threats. America seems to be doing all the right things in this regard whereas North Korea is always acting on impulse, not caring about anything. Some time ago, the reports of radioactive water leak at Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan had appeared in the newspapers and on TVs. In fact this kind of radioactive fluid will pose severe health hazards like radiation sickness.

Unfortunately, the incidents of contaminated water leak from the Fukushima plant into the ocean had long been reported since the plant was hit by the earthquake and tsunami in 2011. The undue fears on the nuclear plants have already bothered the people across the world. At the same time, safety should be on high priority when it comes to embracing greater technologies like nuclear types. It is the responsibility of the International Atomic Energy Agency to keep tabs on the countries like North Korea in order to nip any major tragedy in the bud.

Interestingly, some time back, there were talks between Iran and America in the direction of easing the tension arising out of the Iranian nuclear activities then. Iran is the OPEC’s second largest crude supplier after Saudi Arabia. Any military attack on Iranian nuclear facility will only lead to crude oil crisis in the global market.

One can imagine the global economic crisis if Iran — a major oil supplier — is turned into a battlefield. In this context, the diplomatic efforts of Washington to convince Tehran to abandon its uranium facility had played a major role then. So, the US should try its diplomatic effort towards North Korea until the nuclear conflict is solved amicably.

Finally, the countries all over the world should concentrate on the bigger issues like farm crisis, unemployment and

economic slump.

P Senthil Saravana Durai, Mumbai

Safe roads

Apropos of your editorial “Road to safety” (THT, January 4, Page 8), it is good that the government agency will start collecting road tax from the coming fiscal year. It is important that VAT is also added separately. Safety costs money.

In a country where road accidents are progressing by the day, road taxes should help in maintaining the roads in such conditions as to reduce accidents heavily, if not completely. Good roads with proper illuminations, traffic lights, signages, drains, crossing facilities, animal corridors, emergency parking and safety railings among others come at a cost.

The end-users must pay. It will be good if the agency can come up with scientific charges for public buses, trucks, private vehicles depending on the sizes, motorbikes, cycles and even pedestrians primarily to discourage them to walk along the road for their own safety.

It is also important to have a vehicle weighing machines at entry and exit points to enforce weight limit that cause huge wear and tear on the roads. Since rules for progress cannot be carved in stones, we need to change them as we go along.

Manohar Shrestha, Kathmandu