"TOKYO -- Protesters thronged the wide streets in front of the prime minister’s office in Tokyo over the weekend, and across the country they gathered about a quarter-mile from the entrance of a nuclear plant. They shouted “No to the restart” and parked cars in front of the plant’s access road to block workers from coming or going, according to Japanese media."

"But the workers were already inside.

At the Ohi nuclear facility on Japan’s western shoreline Sunday, those workers went through the technical steps to reboot a reactor, the first to come back online since last year’s massive nuclear accident at Fukushima Daiichi.

The restart at Ohi — with potentially more to follow — will avert dire power shortages and sustain the economy, Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda has told the nation. But the restart also has divided the country, staging an increasingly hostile showdown between the government and those doubtful about its atomic safety claims."

Chico Harlan reports for the Washington Post July 1, 2012. [2]