A team of experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency is set to visit Japan this week to help expedite the cleanup near a nuclear power plant that began leaking radiation after a massive earthquake and tsunami earlier this year.

Officials in Tokyo and at IAEA headquarters in Vienna say the 12-member team will visit several locations in Fukushima prefecture during the visit beginning Friday. The team will also hold meetings in Tokyo with Japanese officials to review cleanup strategies at and near the site.

Separately Tuesday, a nuclear reactor in western Japan shut down automatically, when an alert signaled a problem with a steam condenser. Authorities probing the alarm at the Genkai power plant reported no radiation abnormalities at the site, and said there was no evidence of fire or smoke.

The IAEA visit will be the second of its kind to Japan since the March 11 twin disasters struck the country's northeastern coast, destroying entire communities and leaving an estimated 20,000 people dead or missing.

Chief Cabinet secretary Osamu Fujimura is quoted as saying he hopes the visit will speed up decontamination efforts at and near the shuttered plant by “bringing together wisdom from around the world.”