The Persecution of Aum
On March 20, 1995 Japan experienced its greatest act of terror since the end of World War II. As everyone well knows, some members of a religious organization called Aum Shinrikyo carried out a dastardly attack on crowded trains using the deadly nerve gas sarin. Twelve innocent people lost their lives, many more were seriously injured for life, and a sense of fear spread throughout the entire nation of 125 million people.
The culprits were quickly found out by a huge nationwide police mobilization such that the country had never seen before, and all but a few, who still elude capture in hiding somewhere, have been brought to justice. Ironically the "alleged" (still not convicted) orchestrator of the horrible deed, Chizuo Matsumoto (a.k.a. Asahara), still remains on trial without any verdict against him five years after the fact.
Justice appears to have been served or is being served albeit slowly, and the guilty have been brought to account for their crimes. So, why is the government of Japan carrying out a campaign of persecution against people choosing to believe in the Aum faith? If we were living in Iraq or North Korea blatant disregard for civil and human rights could be expected as a matter of course. But we are living in Japan, which for the latter part of the 20th century is a country that has purported to support and honor the basic rights of human beings, one of which is freedom of religious faith.
In an atmosphere of mass hysteria fueled by near unanimous media calls to "eradicate" Aum Shinrikyo, the Japanese government is guilty of numerous crimes that violate its own constitution and the United Nations Declaration on Human Rights.
Denial of protection against unreasonable arrests and searches - The government has been targeting Aum by arresting its members or people believing in this faith for suspicion of just about anything. The only excuse the police need to arrest Aum believers (or any citizen for that matter) is suspicion of giving a false name or address on just about any kind of document. This behavior of giving false information would naturally be expected from people under mass persecution and being denied basic human rights. The government is then using these unreasonable arrests as reasons to carry out mass searches on Aum facilities and the homes of its members with willful disregard for constitutional guarantees against such abusive government behavior.
Police arrested a shop manager for an Aum-related computer store in July 1998 on suspicion that he falsified his address when registering a new PC-related company. Using the arrest as a reason police then ransacked Aum establishments taking away more than 5,000 items.
The recently freed Aum spokesman, Fumihiro Joyu had been imprisoned for "libel" and not for having a part in any violent activity. In spite of the largest mobilization of police and investigators in the history of Japan, no tangible pieces of evidence were found against Joyu linking him to any crimes other than libel. In other words, he made an accusation that someone else had carried out the gas attacks when in fact he had reason to believe that was not true.
When police and several major news media organizations in Japan "libeled" the husband of one of the Nagano gassing victims, falsely accusing him of having committed the crime, no criminal charges were ever brought against the police or the media. They unfairly ruined the poor grieving man's life, but there was not one shred of accountability in any criminal court for this crime of libel.
Police recently arrested six people in what appeared to be a family custody disagreement over one of Asahara's children (He has many children.) Two of the six people arrested for the "kidnapping" were Asahara's daughters, aged 16 and 18 years old. The police arrested minors in association with the "kidnapping" of their own brother. The news reports read "the boy was rescued unharmed," as if the police really care about the well being of Aum children. The charge against Akira Tone who was taking care of the boy at the time was "using a fictitious name" on the registration for the hotel where he was staying with the boy.
Denial of the right of children to go to school - Several municipal governments have been refusing to admit the innocent children of Aum believers to public schools. This is a clear violation of the right to an education, which is protected by the Constitution of Japan. Moreover, it is considered a "criminal" act (i.e., a violation of the law) for a parent to fail to send a child to school. These government officials, however, are not being charged with a crime when they deny Aum children admittance to school.
Even after acknowledging the constitution and the law, municipal officials in Tokigawa Town of Saitama Prefecture said they would not allow two daughters of Asahara to register for school because this was "a matter beyond the law." After lawyers for the girls started procedures for a legal challenge, Tokigawa officials appear to have changed their stance and may allow the girls to attend school. But the guardians of the girls should not have been required to pay for lawyers. This should have been a simple case for the police to handle as the school's actions were criminal and not a civil matter.
Ottawara Town in Tochigi Prefecture is also engaged in criminal behavior by denying Aum children admittance to school while the local police sit quietly in their kobans ignoring the crime in progress. How many other towns and cities throughout Japan are doing the same thing either through direct or indirect means? And where are the police and why are they not doing their duty to protect these children and enforce the law? Denying Aum children an education only serves to alienate them from society, and it teaches them that laws are meaningless.
Denial of the right to set up residences - Sanwa Town in Ibaraki Prefeture was the first municipality to carry out open persecution of the Aum religion by refusing to register 24 believers to live there. Mayor (or perhaps "Mob Leader" would be a better title) Kijuro Tateno said, "It (the denial of residency) will be a big blow to followers and a step forward for us." He went on to say, that he would not change his decision until Aum believers "change their thinking, leave the cult and apologize for their past actions."
Other than believing in the religious teachings of a man currently on trial for murder, the 24 people applying to live in Sanwa Town had not been guilty of any "past actions" that were criminal. There are laws to protect society from criminal actions, and if any of these people had committed crimes they would surely be in jail rather than applying for residency in Sanwa Town.
You do not need to travel to some remote country area to find narrow-minded religious bigots like Mayor Tateno. Mayor Tsunetoshi Suzuki of Adachi Ward has maintained a policy of refusing Aum believers from registering to live in Adachi Ward. Mayor Suzuki said, "I hope the government will exercise laws strictly and effectively." This was a rather odd thing for Mayor Tateno to say because if laws were exercised strictly and effectively he would be going to jail.
Yokohama Mayor Hidenobu Takahide made a public statement that Fumihiro Joyu was not welcome to live in his city. In spite of Mayor Takahide's attempt to bar Joyu through the force of his spoken warning, Joyu seems to have managed to take up residence. Nevertheless, the Yokohama Aum facility like most throughout Japan has been subjected to incessant harassment by mob-like segments of the population. Police fail to due to their duty by stopping right wingers from making ongoing protests against Aum with loud speakers and then Aum members are blamed for the noise with city official saying this is the reason they must go.
In Ikebukuro a recent closing of an Aum facility was reminiscent of scenes from Maoist China just after the revolution. As Aum believers exited the facility in a motorcade, a mob of angry neighbors gathered to scream insults at the Aum believers complete with spitting and kicking of vehicles while the police sat by quietly with a smug feeling of satisfaction that they had successfully eradicated Aum from the neighborhood.
Denial of the right to basic services needed for living - In January the Dai-Ichi Kangyo Bank Senju Branch denied Aum member Naruhito Noda's request to open a bank account, which is in itself unconstitutional. Without a bank account it is nearly impossible to maintain a living in Japanese society. A person cannot hardly obtain employment without a bank account. Being infuriated as any sensible human being would be, Noda said he would organize a protest against the bank. The police then arrested Noda for "making a threat against the bank." For the record, it is not illegal to threaten a protest against a bank, particularly when the bank is blatantly violating a person's basic human rights.
If threatening to make a protest is a "crime" then free speech is a crime, and anyone who makes any kind of effort to effect change for whatever reason via a protest is subject to being arrested by the Japanese police. The arrest of Naruhito Noda was nothing more than a criminal act by the government of Japan against a law-abiding citizen exercising the constitutionally-guaranteed right of free speech. If police were intent on making an arrest, they should have arrested the bank manager for denying Noda his basic human rights.
Denial of the right to be recognized as a religion - This is mainly related to how a religious group is treated under the tax laws. The result has been an unfair treatment of the Aum faith, and it has given the government a potent weapon to go after Aum for unpaid taxes from its activities that have been set up to support the religion. In a nontax corollary, Aum has even been effectively banned from using its own name. The head receiver for claimants against Aum has declared the name "Aum" its intellectual property.
Why is the government persecuting Aum believers? Another good question would be why is the media taking part in this feeding frenzy and stirring up mass hysteria among the Japanese population?
The government believes that the convicted criminals and the accused not yet convicted of carrying out the Nagano and subway gassings still guide the religion. The government also cites a principle in the previous Aum doctrine that says "taking of life" can be a necessary element. But Aum disavowed this in 1995, and similar doctrines or interpretations of doctrines can be found with many religions around the world, including Christianity.
As a result, the government passed two "Aum laws" in December. One law gives the government the power to "supervise" Aum and "search" Aum facilities. The second law gives the courts more power to seize Aum assets for reimbursing victims of crimes committed by Aum members.
It appears that anyone who espouses a belief in the Aum faith can be subjected to the laws. The government is using surveillance of people holding vigils outside of Asahara's detention facility, people visiting or communicating with members in prison and people associating with Aum as reasons to investigate them.
Why are new laws necessary? There are already laws on the books protecting society against every crime any Aum member has ever been accused of. In addition civil laws have been effective in producing several monetary judgements in favor of the victims for hundreds of millions of yen.
If Aum believers commit crimes they should and will easily be arrested. The problem now is that they are being harassed, denied basic rights and arrested when they have not committed any crimes. The police have done their best to stretch the interpretation of the law to include just about anything as probable cause or reasons for arresting Aum believers.
Since there are over 1,000 Aum members, some of the police actions may be warranted from time to time as in any large group there will always be individuals who commit crimes. Due to repeated gross violations of the rights of these people by the government, however, the police have quickly lost credibility as they have degenerated into nothing more than jack-booted thugs harassing a group of people because their religion is considered undesirable.
In this article, I have carefully avoided the use of the word "cult" in referring to Aum, not because I do not consider Aum a cult, but rather because this is merely an arbitrary designation given to them by the mass media in Japan. These government lapdogs have been all too eager to simply regurgitate whatever the police say as fact and in whatever manner they say it. The point is that "cult" seems to be a word chosen to be used with "undesirable" religious groups. Cult vs. Religion is a matter open for debate and better left to another article, but no one really has the moral authority to say this group is a "religion" and that group is a "cult."
It not my intention to endorse Aum, but just as the ACLU uses its own money to defend the Klu Klux Klan's (a group that most in the ACLU despise) right to espouse their beliefs, I am ready to defend anyone's right to believe in the Aum religion if they so choose to. Harassment and denial of religious freedom and basic human rights are also very serious crimes. It is indeed ironic that the five years after the subway gas attack it is now Aum believers who have become the victims.
Imagine what it must be like to have your children denied admittance to public schools. Imagine what it must be like to have angry mobs outside your homes screaming, kicking and spitting with little hope of police protection. Imagine what life must be like to have your home searched and ransacked. Imagine what it must be like to have your property seized or to be forced to move from your home. Proper punishment for terrorists? Perhaps, but the people currently suffering from these rights abuses are not terrorists and have not committed any crimes other than believing in the Aum faith.
The easiest way for Aum believers would be to renounce their religion and leave Aum, which is what the government wants. But how many of the people reading this story would be so ready to renounce your religion as a means of avoiding persecution? If some Catholics or some Muslims carried out a dastardly act of violence, does that mean that the Catholic or Islamic faiths should be suppressed by the government? Or that law-abiding people who had nothing to do with the crime would have to renounce their faith?
In 1995 Asahara allegedly orchestrated (he has not been convicted yet) a campaign of terror against the Japanese people. In 2000 Shigeo Kifuji, head of the Justice Ministry's Public Security Investigation Agency, is orchestrating a campaign of persecution against Aum Shinrikyo and its believers. It is the job of police and the government to protect all citizens. As much as the government may wish you to believe otherwise, it is not a crime to believe in an undesirable religion, and the persecution of the Aum should stop.
by James C. Gibbs
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