The United Nations had stepped in to help Japan's deepening nuclear power plant crisis since the powerful earthquake has placed the country in turmoil and casting anxiety to other global economies. A meeting will be convened today in Tokyo with government authorities and the UN-led International Atomic Energy Agency.

In an earlier press conference in Vienna, Mr Yukiya Amano, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency said: "Japan faces a serious situation," adding that a meeting will be held in Tokyo this morning.

Mr Amano said that nuclear fuel contained in the reactors, 4, 5 and 6 of the Fukushima Dai-ichi power plant is releasing radiation as broken structures exposed the sensitive energy source.

Authorities from the Tokyo Electric Power Corp (TEPCO), the operator of the nuclear plant, said in another news briefing that the power lines that will generate an electricity-fired cooling system for the nuclear reactors are soon to be completed. However, TEPCO spokesperson Naori Tsunoda could confirm exactly when this will be put on line.

The workers of the plant will be returning to the site, the TEPCO spokesman noted, after they were pulled out Wednesday because of alarming dangerous levels of radiation being emitted by the nuclear reactors.

Since the power lines were cut off at the Fukushima nuclear plant and the entire area of Sendai, workers have been manually trying to cool down the reactors by pumping seawater to the exposed power rods that are highly radioactive.