Hundreds of people rallied in a Tokyo park on Saturday, demanding an end to atomic power nearly two years (Monday is the 2 year anniversary) after the disaster at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear facility in northeastern Japan.

March 11, 2011, when the magnitude 9.0 earthquake -- the strongest recorded in Japan's history -- struck off the coast, followed by the tsunami left nearly 19,000 people dead or missing and more than 300,000 people still displaced.

Japan has struggled to clean up radiation from the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant, whose reactors melted down after its cooling systems were disabled by the tsunami, and rebuild lost communities along the coast. A new government elected in December has vowed faster action, but has yet to devise a post-disaster energy strategy -- a central issue for its struggling economy.

A powerful 8.0 magnitude earthquake set off a tsunami that killed at least five people in a remote part of the Solomon Islands on Wednesday and triggered evacuations across the South Pacific as island nations issued tsunami alerts.

The quake struck 340 km (211 miles) east of Kira Kira in the Solomons, the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii said as it issued warnings for the Solomons and other South Pacific nations including Australia and New Zealand. It later canceled the warnings for the outlying regions.

A tsunami measuring 0.9 metres (three feet) hit near the town of Lata on the remote Santa Cruz island, swamping some villages and the town's main airport as people fled to safety on higher ground.

More than three dozen aftershocks up to magnitude 6.6 rocked the region in the hours after the quake, the U.S. Geological Survey said.

On Saturday, several hundred citizens affected by Hurricane Sandy, healthcare professionals, activists, and members of Occupy Sandy relief effort participated in a rally and march near Fifth Avenue and East 79th Street to protest what organizers said was a lack of care and concern by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

Two months after Superstorm Sandy the disaster is not over and relief needs are still great. Homes are uninhabitable with black mold taking hold, heat and sanitation are still absent in many places. Yet the government response has been glaringly absent. As with Katrina and other recent disaster-and-recovery events city, state and federal agencies have handed off reconstruction resources and responsibility to corporations and markets.

Hospitals that were evacuated due to hurricane damage have not reopened. Healthcare professionals describe conditions that could lead to a public healthcare crisis. Yet, rally participants kept asking, "Where is Mayor Bloomberg?" "Where is FEMA?"

For more information about Occupy Sandy and current lists of urgent needs for the recovery or to make much needed donations, please visit:
http://interoccupy.net/occupysandy/