Japan's nuclear woes, caused by the earthquake and ensuing tsunami, are evolving into a worrying international crisis, threatening the lives of Japanese people and other nationals in the country. The international community should work together to help Japan prevent the situation from worsening.

At the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, explosions and fire have ravaged four out of its six reactor buildings and the containment system around at least one of the reactors appears to have been breached. The dissemination of radioactive substances has drawn concern from surrounding countries.

As conditions at the stricken nuclear power plant deteriorate, it is clear that the crisis is greater than the Three Mile Island accident in the United States in 1979, although not yet on the scale of the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster.

However, aside from evacuating residents from a 20-kilometer radius around the plant, there seems to have been little progress in bringing the situation under control. On Wednesday, some foreign countries stepped up efforts to evacuate their nationals from Japan for fear of radiation exposure.

The international community should take Japan's nuclear crisis as a catastrophe facing all humanity. The Japanese government has asked the United States and the International Atomic Energy Association (IAEA) to help cool the reactors.

Concerned international organizations and countries boasting advanced nuclear power technology should join hands to provide support to Japan in a timely and effective way so that the country can resolve the ongoing crisis soon.

Japan should make public every new development concerning the nuclear plant so that the international community can come up with counter measures, paving the way for an early solution to the current crisis.

Natural disaster apart, human factors have also contributed to the plight of the Japanese nuclear plant, which is afflicted by outdated facilities and had insufficient capability to resist earthquakes. Other countries should heed the lessons and review their strategies on nuclear power development.

Better checks on nuclear facilities and preemptive measures for resisting natural disasters are also necessary so that a similar tragedy does not occur elsewhere in the future.

There has been a public outcry demanding caution and security in the development and operation of nuclear power facilities in many countries around the world. The public concern is justified as Japan's nuclear disaster shows the inherent risks involved in generating nuclear energy, especially for earthquake and natural disaster-prone countries.

While a global overhaul of plans for nuclear power plants could be the immediate result of Japan's current woes, it is still too early to fathom its far-reaching impact on the nuclear power industry and the ecosystem.