Japan launches probe into controversial Unification Church

ISTANBUL

Japan launched investigations into a controversial religious group, the Unification Church, in connection with the assassination of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

The probe, led by Culture Minister Keiko Nagaoka, comes after former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was shot dead in July by a relative of a Unification Church member “who held a grudge against it and believed Abe was a supporter.”

It triggered a volley of suspicions and questions regarding the relations between the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and the controversial group which led to declining support for the Prime Minister Fumio Kishida-led Cabinet.

Kishida told parliament on Monday: “The government has taken seriously the fact that there are a large number of victims as well as poverty and broken families, and they haven't been provided with adequate relief.”

The probe comes as the government “received more than 1,700 consultation requests by Sept. 30 through its telephone service set up on Sept. 5,” said Kishida, according to Kyodo News.

Around half of LDP lawmakers are said to be linked with the group, now rebranded as Family Federation for World Peace and Unification. The probe may cause the group to lose its religious corporation status in the country.

Even if the group, founded in South Korea in 1954 and often labeled as a cult, loses its status as a religious corporation, it will, however, still be able to operate in Japan.

The Unification Church has been accused of forcing followers to make financial donations to the group, engaging in mass weddings, and “spiritual sales.” The followers are pressured to buy jars and other items “for exorbitant prices by the use of threats, including the citing of ‘ancestral karma’.”

Nagaoka, who also holds portfolios of education, sports, science, and technology, said her ministry “is eager to begin the probe as soon as possible.”

“An expert panel on the issue is expected to start considering the details of the investigation as early as Oct. 25,” she said.

A panel of experts at Japan’s Consumer Affairs Agency on Monday also asked the government “to exercise its power to investigate the organization.”

The suggestion came after the agency received many “complaints about the Unification Church purportedly demanding huge donations from its followers that push them to the point of financial ruin” – a claim that Abe’s murderer, Tetsuya Yamagami, had also made.

Yamagami, 41, had said his family “was financially ruined after his mother made huge donations to the church.”