10 years after Aum sarin attacks, pseudo-religions thriving in Japan

By Tim Hornyak ("Japan Today," March 13, 2005)

Extracted from http://wwrn.org/articles/15854/?&section=aum-aleph

Tokyo, Japan — Through the eight long years of his trial, former guru of the Aum Shinrikyo doomsday cult Shoko Asahara said barely a word. As the court handed him the death sentence on Feb 27, 2004, he grinned and pulled faces. No apology, no admission of guilt, no explanation for what many considered Japan's crime of the century: the sarin nerve-gas attack on subway commuters nine years earlier.

At about 8 a.m. on March 20, 1995, a group of five teams of the Supreme Truth sect, which included graduates of Japan's top universities, punctured packages of liquid sarin in subway cars on multiple lines. As the colorless, odorless agent developed by Nazis spread, confused commuters began coughing and gasping for breath, their eyes and noses running, before fleeing panic-stricken through station exits. It was an invisible terror few Tokyoites can forget.

Twelve people died and more than 5,500 were injured in what was the worst peacetime attack in Japanese history. It shattered the country's image as a place free of violent crime.

Newspapers carried headlines on the cult and its investigation by police every day for months.

Asahara's punishment for the subway attack and other criminal cases involving the deaths of 27 people was a forgone conclusion: the hangman's noose. Prosecutors called him the most heinous criminal in Japanese history.

But even today, Aum and other fringe religious groups continue to make headlines while interest in Japan's traditional Shinto and Buddhist faiths continues to decline.

Founded in 1984 in Shibuya, Aum was a mixture of Hindu and Buddhist mysticism topped with millenarian teachings about the creation and destruction of the universe. For Asahara, born into a poor family in Kumamoto Prefecture and visually impaired, it was a means of controlling others and gaining wealth.

Asahara, whose real name is Chizuo Matsumoto, had a miserable childhood and was shipped off to a school for the blind when he was 6, where he allegedly used his limited vision to bully sightless pupils. He dreamed of being a politician, but failed in his bid to enter Tokyo University and pursued massage and acupuncture instead.

At 27, he was arrested for running an illegal pharmacy and selling quack medicine. He opened his own yoga studio, where he focused on developing extrasensory abilities through ascetic training. He claimed a 1986 trip to the Himalayas awakened special powers within him such as levitation and the capability to pass through walls.

Despite stories about demands of absolute loyalty to Asahara and harsh initiation rites at Aum compounds, his sect became one of the fastest-growing new religions in the country. Asahara's ability to lure young people who were rejected by or disillusioned with modern Japanese society was extraordinary.

Aum claimed 10,000 believers in Japan at its peak and tens of thousands more in the United States, Russia and elsewhere. But after the pajama-clad guru's attempt to enter national politics through elections in 1990 failed, Aum turned inward and focused on the coming Armageddon: Japan would suffer a devastating nuclear attack in 1997 and become a wasteland.

"Aum's history coincided with Japan's bubble economy and could be considered a by-product of that bubble," says nonfiction writer Mark Schreiber, adding that one senior Aum member estimated the cult's assets reached $1.5 billion. "Having the funds to buy property and operate ashrams gave Aum respectability, and made its pitch more convincing to potential converts. So its remarkable ability to shake the money tree gave it a spectacular growth trajectory. It seemed to materialize out of nowhere, and the public security agencies whose job is to watch extremist groups were probably caught off guard for this reason. They didn't have time to get information from former cultists or infiltrate the group until it was too late."

By the time Asahara was arrested in May 1995 at the sect's compound in sleepy Kamikuishiki, Yamanashi Prefecture, in the foothills of Mt Fuji, his cult reportedly had a sarin production capacity to kill millions and, according to testimony by former members, could also make anthrax and VX nerve agent.

Japan's horrified public demonstrated against Aum and pushed for controls on religious groups; the government enacted laws to place the group under strict surveillance. But Japan's flirtation with so-called "new religions," both homegrown and foreign, has continued. Regarded as a phenomenon dating to the Meiji Restoration period, Japan's new religions are contrasted with traditional Buddhist sects and shrine Shinto. The largest are Soka Gakkai, Rissho Koseikai and Tenrikyo.

Pseudo-religions grabbing headlines

The arrests of charismatic gurus in recent years for swindling followers or other crimes have underlined the appeal such figures have for some Japanese and fueled public distrust in new pseudo-religions. Ho-no-hana Sampogyo sect leader Hogen Fukunaga was indicted in 2000 on charges of milking 150 million yen out of people through bogus seminars and predictions based on reading the soles of their feet. Prosecutors demanded a 13-year prison sentence in February this year.

In the spring of 2003, a mysterious apocalyptic cult called Pana Wave Laboratory drew headlines and a standoff with police when members camped out on a mountain road in a huge caravan of white vehicles. Claiming to be fleeing electromagnetic waves harming their leader Yuko Chino, the white-clad devotees and the intense media attention they generated were a reminder that eight years after the Aum sarin attack, such sects remain a grave public concern.

Some groups inspire more curiosity than fear. Japan is home to the largest chapter among 60,000 followers around the world claimed by the Raelian group. The Quebec-based Raelians are a media-savvy, publicity-hungry organization based on the beliefs of Frenchman Claude Vorilhon, a former motor racing writer who calls himself Rael. He says aliens created all life on Earth and told him this in a visit during the 1970s. The group has courted international controversy following claims that Clonaid, a firm run by Raelian biologist Brigitte Boisellier, produced the first cloned human baby.

The movement's appeal here is not limited to the fringes of Japanese society. "Buddhism and Shinto have no meaning for me," Tetsuya Ohshima, a web designer in his 30s, said in an interview in 2001. "Japanese don't actively take part in religion. It's just a custom now. Most families have Buddhist and Shinto altars, and on Dec 25 they celebrate Christmas."

Ohshima, who studied biotechnology in college, became a Raelian when he was thinking about how to solve problems like war, famine and poverty. "The Japanese education system doesn't teach about spirituality," he added. "I'm sure that many young people are searching for how to live their lives better. I'm lucky to be able to have found that answer."

Young Japanese apathetic toward religion

Most young Japanese feel apathetic toward religion, with little knowledge of the mainstream Buddhist and Shinto faiths and no interaction with monks and priests. Shinto shrines are visited en masse at New Year's and on other established occasions, but generally as a social custom and not for genuine religious purposes. The enshrining of secular government and religious freedom in the 1947 constitution prompted a decline in organized religion, and the role of the temple is now mainly relegated to providing funeral services.

To fill the void, groups such as Shinrankai, Kenshokai and Worldmate have attracted young Japanese in the competitive belief market, according to Tokyo University religion professor Susumu Shimazono. Loosely organized spirituality and New Age movements, have gained many adherents through distribution channels such as books and seminars.

Nobutaka Inoue, a professor of religious studies at Kokugakuin University, described part of this effect in a 2003 summary of surveys on attitudes toward religion held by young Japanese as the "scenerization of traditional religion" — shrines and temples are still familiar religious establishments but are no longer visited for religious purposes.

"In Japan, there is no dominant religion now," says Inoue, "so young people tend to establish relatively freer religious ideas. Certainly the teachings of the Raelians are quite strange for most Japanese. However, younger generations have less ability to judge whether a religious group is strange or not."

Many of the new followings are closely affiliated with established orders. Shinnyoen is a new Buddhist movement founded by a priest from the traditional Shingon sect in 1936 that now claims some 800,000 followers across Japan. Believers venerate the historical Buddha as well as the Nirvana, and emphasize compassion while practicing sesshin meditation.

Joined while going through depression

Noriko, a Shinnyoen adherent in her 30s, says she joined the movement while going through severe depression, from which she was saved by a visit to group's temple in Tachikawa. She describes the movement as "true blue Buddhism," and distinguishes it from Soka Gakkai, the giant lay Buddhist group founded in 1930 that is behind the ruling bloc's New Komeito party.

"I cannot even remember my mental pain in those times," Noriko says. "I would have committed suicide if I hadn't found this teaching. The deep loneliness I had from childhood completely disappeared."

Noriko says she respects Shinto because it is the "heart of the Japanese people," but is focused on practicing Shinnyoen meditation twice a month to remove bad karma in her life. "Now, every morning I wake up with a peaceful heart like a silent lake without ripples," she says. "I never thought I'd live to see the day."

Meanwhile, Aum returns as Aleph

In 2000, Aum renamed itself Aleph to try and shed its blood-soaked image. Aleph admitted Aum's responsibility in the subway attack, apologized and promised compensation. But its efforts to distance itself from Asahara brought only limited success.

That same year, Aleph leader Fumihiro Joyu, a Waseda University graduate once considered a heartthrob by Japanese women, wrote: "We could say that former Aum Shinrikyo founder Shoko Asahara was a kind of genius in meditation, but at the same time we cannot approve of the incidents his organization caused. While inheriting the superior practices of yoga and Buddhism, and the meditation method his yoga talent has left, we'd like to clearly disapprove of the incidents."

Aleph's membership was recently estimated at as high as 2,000 and monitoring of the group by the Public Security Intelligence Agency continues — as does the controversy surrounding the group. In January, a senior Aum member who had been imprisoned for participating in a deadly 1994 Aum sarin attack on Matsumoto, Nagano Prefecture, was found dead after undergoing "thermal training," which involved bathing in 50ºC water for long periods of time.

Ten years after the subway attack, Asahara is appealing his death sentence, and silence continues to be his strategy. In January, the Tokyo High Court allowed Asahara's lawyers to delay their submission of appeal documents until August because the 49-year-old has kept his mouth shut since 1996. He would not communicate with them and refused to answer questions at the Tokyo Detention House during more than 30 interviews since July. The case is expected to drag on for another 10 years, and some doubt whether he will ever go to the gallows.

For the victims of the gas attacks — many of whom still suffer after-effects including headaches, breathing difficulties and dizziness — some of the pain stems from not understanding why it happened. One senior Aum official testified that it was an attempt to distract police and avoid a raid on the group's headquarters, something that is surely of little comfort.

In researching his book Underground: "The Tokyo Gas Attacks and the Japanese Psyche," Haruki Murakami interviewed Aum followers and asked them whether, given the events of March 20, 1995, they regretted joining the cult. Almost all of them said they had no regrets.

In considering why this is so, Murakami's conclusion also could also be read as a warning: "In Aum they found a purity of purpose they could not find in ordinary society. Even if in the end it became something monstrous, the radiant, warm memory of the peace they originally found remains inside them, and nothing else can easily replace it."

Killer sects: Eternal life and promised land in return of money and soul

By ("Pravda," July 8, 2008)

Extracted from http://wwrn.org/articles/29013/?&section=branch-davidians

Notorious Russian “healer” Grigori Grabovoi, has been found guilty on 11 counts of fraud. Grabovoi set up a sect known as The Teaching of Grigori Grabovoi. He positioned himself as a healer and promised people to resurrect their deceased loved ones. Russia’s law-enforcement agencies paid attention to Grabovoi in 2004, after he publicly claimed to be able to resurrect the children killed in the Beslan school siege. The “healer” charged about 40,000 rubles (about $1600) for his services per person.

The self-proclaimed “healer” has been sentenced to eleven years in jail.

It is worthy of note that specialists have not found a common definition to the word sect. Some determine it as a religious group, which does not have the recognition of the general public. Others say that a sect is an ideological group of people who follow their charismatic leader. Both of these definitions say that a sect leader has a very strong influence in his supporters. Below you can find the list of the most dangerous sects in the world.

5. Seventh-Day Adventists. The Church of Seventh-Day Adventists appeared in the United States during the middle part of the 19th century and was formally established in 1863. Among its founders was Ellen G. White, whose extensive writings are still held in high regard by the church today.

Much of the theology of the Seventh-day Adventist church corresponds to evangelical teachings such as the Trinity and the infallibility of Scripture. Distinctive teachings include the unconscious state of the dead and the doctrine of an investigative judgment. The church is also known for its emphasis on diet and health, for its promotion of religious liberty, and for its culturally conservative principles.

A tragedy happened in the USA in the 1990s, when about a hundred of Adventists were killed. David Koresh, the leader of a Branch Davidian religious sect, which spun off from the Seventh-day Adventist church, prophesied about the coming end of the world for too long. The fake messiah did not want to leave the world alone. About a hundred of his insane supported, including Koresh himself, died in the fire during the siege of their building in Waco.

4. The Manson Family. Charles Manson was a mentally unstable individual, a maniac who considered himself a prophet. He declared war between the black and the white races. He said that he had foreseen that war that would clear the planet. At the time the Family began to form, Manson was an unemployed ex-convict, who had spent half his life in correctional institutions for a variety of offenses. In the period before the murders, he was a distant fringe member of the Los Angeles music industry, chiefly via a chance association with Beach Boy Dennis Wilson. After Manson was charged with the crimes, recordings of songs written and performed by him were released commercially; artists including Guns 'N' Roses and Marilyn Manson have covered his songs in the decades since.

Manson's death sentence was automatically reduced to life imprisonment when a decision by the Supreme Court of California temporarily eliminated the state's death penalty. California's eventual reestablishment of capital punishment did not affect Manson, who is an inmate at Corcoran State Prison.

3. Heaven’s Gate. Heaven's Gate was the name of an American UFO religion based in San Diego, California and led by Marshall Applewhite and Bonnie Nettles. The group's end coincided with the appearance of Comet Hale-Bopp in 1997. Applewhite convinced thirty-eight followers to commit suicide, which he claimed would allow their souls to board a spaceship that they believed was hiding behind the comet.

Further, Heaven's Gate believed that the planet Earth was about to be recycled (wiped clean, refurbished and rejuvenated), and that the only chance to survive was to leave it immediately. While the group was formally against suicide, they defined "suicide" in their own context to mean "to turn against the Next Level when it is being offered", and believed that their "human" bodies were only vessels meant to help them on their journey.

2. Aum Shinrikyo. Aum Shinrikyo, now known as Aleph, is a Japanese new religious movement organization. The group was founded by Shoko Asahara in 1984. The group gained international notoriety in 1995, when it carried out the sarin gas attack in the Tokyo subways.

The movement was founded by Shoko Asahara in his one-bedroom apartment in Tokyo's Shibuya ward in 1984, starting off as a Yoga and meditation class known as Aum-no-kai ("Aum club") and steadily grew in the following years. It gained the official status as a religious organization in 1989. It attracted such a considerable number of young graduates from Japan's elite universities that it was dubbed a "religion for the elite".

On December 11, 2002, The Canadian government added Aum to its list of banned terrorist groups. The EU has designated Aum Shinrikyo as a terrorist organization. The United States also maintains Aum on its list of foreign terrorist groups.

1. People’s Temple. It is the most horrendous sect in the world. Peoples Temple was an organization founded in 1955 by Reverend James Warren Jones (Jim Jones) that, by the mid-1970s, possessed over a dozen locations in California. Peoples Temple is best known for the death of over 900 of its members that occurred in Guyana at the Peoples Temple Agricultural Project (informally called "Jonestown"), a nearby airstrip at Port Kaituma and Georgetown, on November 18, 1978.

The Peoples Temple purported to practice what it called "apostolic socialism." In doing so, the Temple openly preached to established members that "religion is an opiate to the people." Accordingly, "those who remained drugged with the opiate of religion had to be brought to enlightenment - socialism." In that regard, Jones also openly stated that he "took the church and used the church to bring people to atheism." Jones often mixed those concepts, such as preaching that "If you're born in this church, this socialist revolution, you're not born in sin. If you're born in capitalist America, racist America, fascist America, then you're born in sin. But if you're born in socialism, you're not born in sin."

On November 17, 1978, the group was visited at Jonestown by Leo Ryan, a United States Congressman from the San Francisco area, who was investigating claims of abuse within the Peoples Temple. During this visit, a number of Temple members expressed a desire to leave with the Congressman, and on the afternoon of November 18, these members accompanied Ryan to the local airstrip at Port Kaituma. There they were intercepted by Temple security guards who opened fire on the group, killing Congressman Ryan, three journalists, and one of the Temple defectors. A few seconds of gunfire from the incident were captured on video by Bob Brown, one of the journalists killed in the attack. On the evening of November 18, in Jonestown, Jones ordered his congregation to drink cyanide-laced Flavor Aid. It was later determined that Jones died from a gunshot, with a contact wound in a location and angle consistent with being self-inflicted. His body was also found to contain high doses of drugs. In all, 918 people died, including over 270 children. This includes four that died at the Temple headquarters in Georgetown that night.

Final cult fugitive from 1995 nerve gas attack on Tokyo subway caught at comic-book cafe

By ("Associated Press," June 14, 2012)


Extracted from http://wwrn.org/articles/37510/?&place=asia-pacific

Tokyo, Japan - His trail cold for years, the last fugitive suspected in a doomsday cult’s deadly nerve gas attack on Tokyo’s subways in 1995 was caught at a comic book cafe Friday, closing a chapter on Japan’s worst terrorist attack.

He had altered his appearance and reportedly used a fake name and avoided meeting people to evade arrest, but Katsuya Takahashi admitted who he was when approached by police at the cafe in downtown Tokyo.

The former bodyguard for the Aum Shinrikyo cult leader, Takahashi had been on Japan’s most wanted list for years for his suspected participation in the sarin gas attack that killed 13 people and injured about 6,000, shattering Japan’s long-held sense of safety.

According to media reports, he worked for a construction company and avoided capture for years by using fake names, wearing a surgical mask on the job and seeking assignments that didn’t involve meeting people.

The manhunt heated up after the June 3 arrest of another cult fugitive, Naoko Kikuchi, who reportedly lived with Takahashi for a time and had information about him. Thousands of officers hunted for Takahashi across the capital, handing out fresh photos of him and monitoring transportation hubs to keep him from escaping.

Takahashi disappeared from his job after Kikuchi’s arrest, but an employee at the comic book cafe where he was spotted told a TV talk show Friday that he had visited the shop several times recently.

A cafe employee recognized Takahashi and called police, a Tokyo police spokeswoman said on condition of anonymity, citing department rules. Police arrested him on suspicion of murder, she said.

TV footage showed a huge crowd outside the cafe, trying to glimpse the last cult fugitive. Public broadcaster NHK showed a thin, bespectacled Takahashi being pushed into a police car.

The 54-year-old’s appearance has changed greatly — in particular, his trademark bushy eyebrows have become much thinner. So police had to wait while his fingerprints were verified. He was arrested after being taken to a nearby police station, then transferred to Tokyo police headquarters for interrogation, police said.

Takahashi told police that he was only following the orders of higher-ups but not fully aware of the purpose, reports said.

The manhunt was one of the longest ever in Japan. Nobuko Shigenobu, a former Red Army extremist, was on the run for 26 years from 1974 until her arrest in 2000.

The Aum cult had amassed an arsenal of chemical, biological and conventional weapons in anticipation of an apocalyptic showdown with the government. Top cultists sometimes used illegal drugs and electric shocks to brainwash followers with apocalyptic teachings. Police reportedly found about a dozen Aum textbooks in Takahashi’s bag later Friday in a coin-operated locker, and plan to examine whether he is still controlled by the cult teachings.

Masaki Kito, a lawyer and a long-time Aum watcher, said Takahashi’s arrest and investigation could provide a fuller picture of the Aum cult’s crimes.

“The case has never been fully resolved,” Kito said in one of the TV talk shows that were dominated by news of Takahashi’s arrest. “He was a last piece of a jigsaw puzzle.”

Nearly 200 cult members have been convicted in the 1995 attack and dozens of other crimes. Thirteen, including cult guru Shoko Asahara, are on death row.

Police have been criticized for a series of bunglings in the investigation. They were aware that there was something ominous about the group, which had a highly guarded commune at the foot of Mt. Fuji, but they could not prevent the sarin attack. A near-fatal shooting of the chief of National Police Agency at the time, in which an Aum member was suspected, closed unresolved in 2010 due to a statute of limitations.

Takahashi had been Asahara’s bodyguard, and authorities say he was assigned to the cult’s “intelligence ministry” in charge of plotting attacks and coverup schemes. He allegedly helped one of the members who released sarin on one of the subway lines run away from the scene. He is also suspected in a 1995 cult-related kidnapping-murder, as well as a mail bomb that injured a Tokyo city employee.

Police had come close to capturing Takahashi and Kikuchi in 1996. They had traced them to an apartment in Tokorozawa city, just north of Tokyo, but lost them just before raiding the hideout.

Takahashi disappeared for many years, but the recent arrests of the other two fugitives helped police get back on his trail. Makoto Hirata, 47, charged in the 1995 kidnapping-murder as well as the subway attack, surrendered to police on New Year’s Eve. Kikuchi, 40, was arrested earlier this month after she was spotted in Sagamihara city, 30 kilometers (20 miles) southwest of Tokyo. She is accused of helping produce the deadly sarin.

Kikuchi reportedly told police that she and Takahashi moved to an apartment together in Kawasaki, just south of Tokyo, in 1997, each using an alias. Kikuchi left the apartment five years ago but Takahashi remained until last year, when he moved to a company dorm in the same city, according to NHK.

He began working at a construction company around 2004 under the name of Shinya Sakurai. He quit in 2008 but returned last October, media reports said. His former boss, whose name was not released, said Takahashi was often wearing a surgical mask, and he asked for assignments that didn’t require meeting people.

The day after Kikuchi’s arrest, Takahashi reportedly called his boss, saying he needed a week off because his relatives were dying. He then dropped by a credit union to withdraw some 2.3 million yen ($29,000) in cash, bought a travel bag and disappeared.

Images of the fugitive were captured by security cameras, parts of which were released to the media. He wore different clothes almost at each location, in an apparent attempt to avoid detection.

The Aum cult once had 10,000 members in Japan and claimed another 30,000 in Russia. It still has hundreds of members. The cult is under police surveillance and its current leaders have publicly disavowed Asahara.

Japan's Aum Shinrikyo cult never really died

By Mutsuko Murakami ("New Straits Times," July 31, 2012)

Extracted from http://wwrn.org/articles/37845/

When Katuya Takahashi, 54, was arrested at a manga coffee shop in Tokyo in the middle of last month, it marked the end of the 17-year-long search for the last of the three fugitives suspected of crimes by the notorious doomsday cult, Aum Shinrikyo.

He is suspected to be a part of the 1995 deadly sarin gassing in Tokyo subways that killed 13 and injured more than 6,000 people.

Dozens of the cult leaders and followers have been arrested and given sentences in court trials -- with capital punishment finalised for its top leader Shoko Asahara.

The cult had been long buried in oblivion in the minds of most Japanese, but the investigation continued in search of the three fugitives who remained elusive, until recently.

On the last day of 2011, Makoto Hirata, 46, voluntarily surrendered at a police station in downtown Tokyo, which was a big surprise. And early in June this year, Naoko Kikuchi, the second fugitive, was caught in a Tokyo suburb, followed by the recent arrest of Takahashi.

All three looked quite different from their old photographs in the "wanted" posters shown in public places all these years, indicating the length of the period they had hid themselves.

Now that they were back in the news, it not only awakened the Japanese to memories about the cult that attempted to overthrow the nation, but the arrests of the fugitives also reminded them that the cult has not quite died out.

According to reports, the Aum Shinrikyo once had more than 10,000 followers in its prime.

After its terror crimes were known and its leaders were arrested, the group broke up into two splinter groups.

Its mainstream group, renamed Aleph since 2000, has successfully gained more followers in recent years, police say. It now has about 1,100 followers, of which more than 200 joined last year.

Analysts point out that the new followers are young people who do not know much about Aum Shinrikyo. The cult recruiters also skilfully lure the vulnerable young into free fun events, meditation or yoga activities, often via social networking.

With a successful computer sale business, the group has set up headquarters in Tokyo as well as more than 20 other facilities. The Public Safety Authority still tracks Aum Shinrikyo splinter groups and keeps the major group under constant surveillance.

I once observed the trial procedures of Asahara at the Tokyo Higher Court in l998. Next to me were a bunch of enthusiastic followers loudly admiring their leader.

I later interviewed a few of them, who were firm in their faith with signs of brainwashing. Seeking salvation and values only in their faith, they appeared unable to see other life options.

I remember their faces as we learned that Takahashi still appears to maintain faith in the cult's teachings.

Police found in his bag the books and lecture tape of the cult leader as well as his photographs.

He told police he would like to continue meditation and religious training in the detention centre. The cult, indeed, never died.

Meanwhile, the stories about his arrest exposed a new face of Japanese society.

While police investigators had a hard time with their search even after he was spotted, he was finally closed in on by hundreds of surveillance cameras set up at stations, stores, companies and offices and on streets.

A camera at a bank showed his face from different angles as he desperately withdrew cash from his account. A convenience store camera showed a new bag he had purchased.

Another one had him getting into a taxi, indicating his intention of staying away from stations and other places with cameras installed.

These images were immediately released via media, letting people know what he looked like.

Excited by the media's real-time reports about the chase drama unfolding, citizens were also very cooperative, functioning as "citizen police" as dubbed by the media. During 11 days of the chase, over 1,800 citizens called police to provide information.

After all, Japan has installed more than three million such surveillance cameras in public places in big cities across Japan, it is said.

And according to a survey by the police a few years ago, a majority of the Japanese on the poll favoured the surveillance by cameras, preferring greater security to privacy.

It is certainly a consequence of Japan's experience of having such a cult nearly 20 years ago.

Religion finds fallow fields in Japan today

By Julia Duin ("The Washington Times," December 27, 2002)

Extracted from http://wwrn.org/articles/12213/

While former nightclub musician Marre Ishii, 37, whaled away at the piano, a backup six-piece band belted out ear-splitting tunes and about 50 Japanese young people dressed in a variety of punk-style costumes lifted their hands and clapped.

They were at Committed Japan, a youth-oriented church that uses rock music, evangelizes through a nearby cafe and sells its conferences, CDs and books using standard marketing methods.

Unhappy with traditional Japanese churches that average only 35 worshippers per Sunday, Mr. Ishii began his own church in September 1995 with four persons in an apartment. Now Committed Japan oversees a network of small churches and Bible-study groups numbering 170 persons.

"Japanese people are seeking hope," said Mr. Ishii, lounging in the church-owned Kick Back Cafe in a western Tokyo suburb. Those who fail to attain it, he added, may wind up throwing themselves in the path of a commuter train.

His church has an ingredient that is rare in Japan today: religious conviction. Although Japanese marry with native Shinto ceremonies, mourn their dead in Buddhist rites, and some worship as Christians, Muslims or other religions, public discourse is hardly influenced by theocentric concerns.

Mark Mullins, who teaches comparative religion at Sophia University in downtown Tokyo, says most Japanese avoid religion.

"Since the Aum incident, there's been a huge fallout," he said, referring to the March 1995 sarin-gas attack on the Tokyo subway system by adherents of Aum Shinrikyo — an apocalyptic group of Shiva worshippers founded by "Venerated Master Shoko Asahara" (born Chizuo Matsumoto in 1955) — that killed 12 persons and sickened more than 5,000.

"Now religion is connected with violence and considered dangerous. Before the Aum incident, you'd see religious groups handing out materials at the train stations. That has disappeared. There's not a lot of interest in religion, period."

Nobutaka Inoue, a professor of Japanese culture at Kokugakuin University in Tokyo, also faults the Aum incident for dampening interest.

"For the younger generation, religion is a little bit dangerous," he said. "They may believe in God or spiritual beings, but belonging to an actual group is another matter. Young people see religious people as overly concerned with money or involved with scandal."

This is not to say that the Japanese aren't spiritual: Memorials to aborted fetuses at Buddhist temples such as Hase-Kannon temple in Kamakura, dedicated to the goddess of mercy, and Zojo-ji in Tokyo testify that this is a people who believe strongly in the soul and some form of life after death.

"People will drop by the Meiji Shrine on New Year's," said Mr. Mullins, referring to the country's best-known Shinto sanctuary, "but they don't go anywhere where people will know them. You have a growth of anonymous religious behavior in Japan. Japan has always had an eccentric religious environment."

Shinto ("the way of the gods"), the Japan's indigenous religion, dates to prehistoric times and has no founder or scripture. It concerns harvest and fertility, emperor worship and birth ceremonies. State Shinto, a mixture of religion and patriotism, was the force that propelled many to sacrifice their lives for the emperor during World War II.

Confucianism, the next-oldest religion, has been in Japan since 404 A.D. Most followers of this religion took up Buddhism, which came via Korea sometime around 600 A.D.

Christianity was brought to Japan in 1549 by Francis Xavier, founder of the Roman Catholic Society of Jesus (Jesuits). Rivalry with other Catholic missionary groups, and later with Dutch Protestants, for Japanese converts and influence led to restrictions on Christianity in 1612 and a nationwide ban two years later. Japanese Christians were persecuted under the rule of the Tokugawa shoguns and went underground until 1873, when religious sanctions were withdrawn under the Meiji imperial government.

Some 75 percent of Japanese have Buddhist or Shinto altars in their homes and almost 90 percent pay visits to ancestral graves on religious festivals. Two percent or fewer of Japan's 127 million people consider themselves to be Christians.

However, Japanese like to sample Western Christian customs, such as church weddings and black gospel music. According to a 1999 study published by Kokugakuin University, Japanese associate Christmas with the following in descending order: Santa Claus, Christmas trees, presents, cake, parties, Jesus Christ, church ceremonies and Christmas cards.

But Japanese Christian churches are competing head-to-head with Shinto shrines as a place for wedding ceremonies as more people select Western-style weddings.

"This is a big debate in the Christian community," said Mr. Mullins. "Some say the bride and groom should be Christian. Others say this is the first time the Japanese have asked [Christians] for anything. Usually, we have to go out to them."

So do some of the Buddhist variants, such as Soka Gokkai, Mr. Inoue said. "They preach aggressively to strangers," he said. "The proselytizing attitude is quite problematic to the Japanese. They're even more aggressive than the Mormons."

Islam, which is growing in many other countries, Mr. Inoue added, has no more than 2,000 adherents in Japan, where all religions are trying to maintain a connection to the past while adapting to the future.

"Nothing is growing in Japan," he said. Church membership and attendance are "lessening here, but the interest in spirituality is growing."

"People are looking for something for mental healing, to ease the stress here."

If anything, he added, Japanese are more interested in phenomena such as space aliens, UFOs, exorcism and psychic phenomena. "Uri Geller," he said of the self-described psychic, "is popular here."

The Japanese have been vastly affected by globalization, in which "the religious culture has gotten mixed up," the scholar explained. "Japanese culture is changing because of so many foreign elements in it. People are still asking: 'Who am I?'

"Less and less people eat rice in the morning. More drink coffee and eat bread. Our culture is changing, and so is our religious culture. No religion here has a proper attitude toward this situation."

Michael Wenger, dean of Buddhist studies at the San Francisco Zen Center, said religion has to engage the culture to be effective. Buddhism is growing in the United States, he suggested, because of its allure among Americans as a sophisticated religion that encompasses faith and doubt.

"But in Japan, a lot of people think of Buddhism as 'old hat,'" he said. "They think of it as ancestor worship."

Masamaro Ohazaki, spokesman for Tsukiji Hongwanji, a venerable Tokyo temple belonging to the 10 million-member Jodo Shinshu sect of Buddhism, said attendance there is decreasing.

"People today tend to be attracted by prosperity and commercial benefits," he said. "New religions or cults offer that. Buddhism doesn't offer such profits. It focuses more on life after death."

Youth are more attracted to the "new religions," he went on — everything from Scientology and the Jehovah's Witnesses to several hundred variants on Shinto and Buddhism that sprang up in Japan starting in the 19th century.

"Because the new religions have no baggage or history, they can do whatever they want," he said. "Buddhism with its dark, old image has a hard time adopting new measures."

The Japanese brand of Buddhism is almost Hindu-like in its acceptance of multiple gods, said Shoshin Ichishima, a Buddhist professor at Taisho University in Tokyo.

"Even Christianity's God we'll accept," he said. "But the Japanese like the oriental way of thinking. We are more into nature worship. In Japanese, the word 'kami,' for God, means an impersonal force."

That is a major problem faced by Christians, for whom God is addressed as Father. Christian missionaries say that one would never use in prayer among Japanese the casual terms that Westerners use.

"In this culture, you'd never address God on familiar terms, because that is presupposing you are on equal terms with that person," said Marty Shaw, who works in Tokyo for Conservative Baptist International (CBI).

Moreover, historically in Japan, the mother is seen as nurturing, he said, while the father is stern and unapproachable — an image that only began to fade after World War II.

"Even Japanese believers have a difficult time worshipping [the Christian] God, because the expressions are not their own," said Ken Taylor, a missionary with CBI. "Everything in a typical Japanese church — from the music to the architecture — is imported.

"There are high percentages of Japanese converting to Christianity outside the country, but when they come back, they can't find a church like the one they left."

"A lot of Japanese churches are set in a Confucian system, where the elders rule," said Gary Fujino, a Southern Baptist missionary in Tokyo. "These churches are not going to change. Some say the Japanese church is too indigenized."

Observed Mr. Shaw of CBI: "When you enter a traditional church in Japan, it's a time warp. You are walking into a 1940s, 1950s kind of place. The church is irrelevant.

"Christianity attracts here through its weddings and black gospel music, but that is all surface. Missions organizations are quite discouraged. But when the Holy Spirit decides to move, He'll move."

Experts: Cults, terrorists share chilling similarities

By James Long ("The Oregonian," November 23, 2001)

Extracted from http://wwrn.org/articles/3785/?&place=united-states&section=other-nrms

The Rajneeshees, who ran a commune in central Oregon in the 1980s, did not fit the popular image of would-be terrorists.

Most followers of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh were not wild-eyed fanatics, but middle-class lawyers, doctors, accountants, teachers and other well-educated people who seemed normal enough.

Americans were shocked to learn in 1985 that this outpost of transplanted suburbanites was a launching pad for the first large-scale biological attack in U.S. history: the poisoning of 751 people in The Dalles, Ore., with restaurant food sprinkled with salmonella germs grown in a commune laboratory.

But cult psychology experts say such an incident should come as no great surprise to anyone. It merely underscores the fact that seemingly normal, well-educated people can be persuaded to commit unthinkable crimes, including flying airliners into skyscrapers.

"There are many similarities between the way people are programmed in cults and in terror groups that can result in an act of suicide bombing," says Steve Hassan, a former member of the Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church.

Hassan has counseled ex-cult members in Florida for 20 years and says many, including himself, would have been "ready to die for the cause if necessary."

That certainly was the case with the 19 hijackers involved in the Sept. 11 terror attacks.

Contrary to what the public may believe, cult experts say, the suicide pilots were probably neither crazy nor motivated, except in a superficial sense, by hatred for the United States.

The chilling and mundane likelihood, they say, is that someone talked the attackers into it over an extended period of time, using techniques that every former cult member and deprogrammer would recognize.

"What I find so astonishing is that most people don't realize how influenceable all humans are," says Margaret Singer, an emeritus professor of psychology at the University of California at Berkeley.

Singer's interviews of nearly 6,000 former cult members have convinced her that groups as dissimilar as the hippie-style Rajneeshees and the suicidal People's Temple recruit and control members in much the same way, despite vast differences in ideology.

"They're all extended con games," Singer says, "whether it's a cult or a terrorist organization."

In 1994 and 1995, Japan's Aum Shinri Kyo doomsday cult killed 19 people and injured more than 5,500 in two nerve-gas attacks in Matsumoto and Tokyo.

In the Tokyo attack, 10 cult members simultaneously boarded subway trains in five locations with containers of deadly sarin -- a coordinated effort at mass murder not unlike the Sept. 11 attacks in the United States.

Dr. Steven DuBrow-Eichel, a Philadelphia psychiatrist who specializes in cults, thinks the Qaeda terrorist group, chief suspect in the Sept. 11 hijackings, most closely resembles Aum Shinri Kyo.

"Their apocalyptic vision is similar in many ways," he says, "and their methods are very similar."

In his view, al Qaeda and Aum Shinri Kyo are almost indistinguishable in their adulation of a single charismatic leader -- Osama bin Laden for al Qaeda, Shoko Asahara for the Japanese group -- and in their sincere conviction that God sent them to purify the world.

Al Qaeda's chosen enemies -- chiefly the United States -- are equated with disease and therefore in need of cleansing. It is almost, says DuBrow-Eichel, like being attacked by fanatical hygienists.

By accepting that the cult is good and anyone who disagrees with it is evil, there can be no guilt in killing those who disagree.

People who have treated former cult followers are not surprised at the profiles of the suspected suicide pilots of Sept. 11. They were very much like the middle-class recruits of the Rajneeshees and Aum Shinri Kyo.

Mohamed Atta, the suspected leader of the suicide bombers, has been described in news reports as a shy, considerate son of a lawyer and very bright.

He grew up in a religious home and studied architecture at the University of Cairo. He joined an Islamic militant society, sympathizing with insurgents who blamed Egypt's secular government for extremes of wealth and poverty.

While living in Hamburg, Germany, Atta made lengthy trips to the Middle East. He returned from one visit, friends thought to Afghanistan, with a new beard and a new personality. The new Atta didn't smile and, one friend recalled, refused to shake hands with a woman.

After Atta was identified as the suspected pilot of American Airlines Flight 11, the first to crash into the World Trade Center, his bewildered father told reporters it must have been someone else. He insisted that someone must have stolen his son's identity.

The father's disbelief, therapists say, is a familiar one. They can recount hundreds of stories about people undergoing personality changes so radical their families scarcely know them.

Cults offer instant acceptance and use a variety of tactics to indoctrinate new members. They hear and see only what the cult leaders approve.

Communication with the outside is cut off. To reinforce the member's group identity, a new name and distinctive clothing may be provided.

The group's goals become paramount. Good and bad are defined in terms of doing the leaders' bidding.

The general theme is that members of the cult are a chosen few who will reap a great reward.

Depending on the cult, it may be guaranteed entry to heaven, survival of Armageddon or a reserved seat on a UFO.

"It's an us-against-them mentality," Singer says. "The cult members or the terrorists are the elite, and all the rest of the world is unworthy of life."

Explosion of cults in Japan fails to heed deadly past

By Justin Norrie ("The Age," November 2, 2007)

Extracted from http://wwrn.org/articles/26770/?&place=japan&section=other-nrms

Tokyo, Japan - ACCORDING to a lazy view entrenched in the West, 21st-century Japan is a godless wonderland of consumerism and technological fetishes.

Yoshihide Sakurai, professor of sociology at Hokkaido University, knows how misguided this stereotype is. Not long after he began investigating how a local religious cult, Tenchi Seikyo, was extorting millions of yen from its elderly members, he received a visit from two members, who drove their car through the wall of his Sapporo home.

"I discovered that Japanese people are in fact very serious about god," Professor Sakurai jokes.

The attack occurred two years after the notorious Aum Shinrikyo group murdered 12 people in 1995 by releasing sarin gas on the Tokyo subway, provoking a fierce backlash against Japan's legion of small, secretive cults.

Twelve years later, however, Japan appears to have forgotten about the atrocities carried out by Aum leader Shoko Asahara and his brainwashed disciples. Aided by the internet and other mass media, cults are flourishing, to the point where some experts estimate shinshuukyo — or new religions — number in the thousands, and count one in five Japanese among their ranks.

The country was given a terrifying reminder of cults' capacity for violence two weeks ago, when police arrested members of the female-dominated Kigenkai sect, who allegedly kicked and punched another member until she died from shock.

Hundreds of cases like this fill the vaults of the Japan Society for Cult Prevention and Recovery's office in Tokyo's Shinjuku district. Professor Sakurai, who sits on its board, says the accumulating files are symptomatic of a social malaise that festered for decades and was ignited by the collapse of Japan's economic bubble 16 years ago.

"Young people and old alike are seeking an antidote to the meaninglessness in their lives. They want salvation from this new competitive society in Japan," he says. "I think that's why Japan, more than any other country, has had this very serious problem with cults."

Other experts say that the atomisation of the family unit has forced youth to look for comfort in the folds of small religious movements that promise enlightenment and deliverance from suffering.

According to the Government's Agency for Cultural Affairs, there are more than 182,000 religious corporations registered nationwide. Nobutaka Inoue, a professor of Shinto studies at Tokyo's Kokugakuin University, estimates that "at least 500 of these" would be new religions, but reckons there are a "considerable number more that no one knows about". The Shinjuku-based cult prevention society says the number is into the thousands.

Many are harmless. Others, such as the Holy God Central Church, whose leader was sentenced last December to 20 years' prison for molesting seven girls, are sexually exploitative. And others still, such as Soka Gakkai, are highly organised. Soka Gakkai wields considerable influence in the New Komeito Party, a partner in the country's ruling coalition.

A small few, such as Aum, are militant, armed and prepared to kill.

"It's difficult to judge which groups are dangerous," says Professor Inoue. "The problem is we usually don't know how dangerous they are until they act."

On Monday, a raid involving 400 police arrested the last of 30 female members of the Kigenkai sect in Komoro, a quiet town in the country's central Nagano Prefecture. Sect members are accused of subjecting fellow cultist Motoko Okuno, 63, to an hour-long ordeal of kicks and punches that led to her death.

Among those rounded up were four teenagers — two of them junior high school girls — and one of the cult's ringleaders, Yasuko Kubota, whose father Kensuke Matsui founded the Shinto-influenced group in 1970.

The victim's husband and two daughters are also alleged to have taken part in the attack, reportedly meted out as punishment for the restaurant owner's lax lifestyle.

Although Kigenkai is thought to have as few as 300 followers, it has been registered with the Ministry of Education as an official religious organisation for the past 10 years. Critics claim they bottle ordinary water to sell as an elixir called Kigensui for more than 50,000 yen ($A475) a litre.

The cults that have flooded Japan's postwar spiritual chasm are so numerous, Professor Inoue says, that people have a hard time working out which of them are good — and which are evil.

That may explain why Tokyo rail commuters fail to blink as they pass giant billboards erected by the Raelian movement, a religion founded by a Frenchman but with its greatest support in Japan. Its followers insist mankind was created by extraterrestrials and claim to have successfully cloned a human.

"The sad thing is that I have students now who haven't even heard of Aum or these other groups," says Professor Sakurai. "When that happens, you have to worry about the possibility we have for repeating the mistakes of the past."

Tokyo cult attack suspect relieved by her arrest

By Mari Yamaguchi ("Associated Press," June 4, 2012)

Extracted from http://wwrn.org/articles/37410/

Tokyo, Japan - A woman wanted for 17 years for allegedly helping to produce the deadly nerve gas used in a 1995 attack on Tokyo subways said she feels relief at her arrest because she doesn't have to hide her identity anymore, police said Monday.

Naoko Kikuchi is a former member of the Aum Shinrikyo cult that released the nerve gas sarin in Tokyo's subways in 1995, killing 13 people and injuring more than 6,000. The cult had amassed an arsenal of chemical, biological and conventional weapons in anticipation of an apocalyptic showdown with the government.

Police on Sunday arrested Kikuchi, 40, after she was spotted in Sagamihara city, 30 kilometers (20 miles) southwest of Tokyo, where she had been living since 2010. She admitted who she was when officers approached her.

She was one of two remaining cult members wanted as murder suspects in the case.

Kikuchi has admitted to helping in the sarin production, but told investigators that she didn't know at that time what the substance was, a Tokyo Metropolitan Police spokesman said on condition of anonymity, citing department rules.

She also admitted to using an alias and moving every few years to avoid detection.

"I had to hide my identity and used an alias all these years while I was on the run. Now I'm arrested and I don't have to do that anymore. I feel relieved," the police quoted her as saying.

Investigators had to verify her identity by fingerprints and a mole on the right cheek as her appearance had changed substantially from the way she looked in wanted posters due to weight loss over the years.

A man claiming to have lived with Kikuchi for the past six years turned himself in Monday, the police spokesman said.

Hiroto Takahashi, 41, said the couple moved to an apartment in Sagamihara in 2010, police said. He was arrested on suspicion of hiding a suspect.

Police searched the apartment for clues about Kikuchi's 17-year hideout and that may lead to the one remaining fugitive, Katsuya Takahashi, 54, who is not related to Kikuchi's partner.

Nearly 200 members of the Aum Shinrikyo cult have been convicted in the gas attack and dozens of other crimes. Thirteen, including cult guru Shoko Asahara, are on death row.

Makoto Hirata, charged in a 1995 cult-related kidnapping-murder, as well as the subway attack, surrendered to police on New Year's Eve, ending his 17-year life on the run and stunning the nation.

The cult, renamed Aleph, once had 10,000 members in Japan and claimed another 30,000 in Russia. It still has hundreds of members. The cult is under police surveillance and its new leaders have publicly disavowed Asahara.

Police believe AUM nurse helped Hirata while he was on the run

By ("The Mainichi Daily News," January 6, 2012)

Extracted from http://wwrn.org/articles/36752/

Mainichi, Japan - Former AUM Shinrikyo cult member Makoto Hirata, arrested on New Year's Day after turning himself in to Tokyo police, received support from a woman he had apparently been with in the mid-1990s and others while he was on the run, investigators suspect.

Hirata has refused to talk much about how he spent nearly 17 years as a fugitive until he turned himself in to the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) on New Year's Eve.

The MPD suspects that Hirata was with a 49-year-old female cult follower sometime around 1996.

The woman, who served as a nurse for the cult, allegedly helped Hirata escape from police and hide, according to investigators.

There are signs that Hirata lived with the woman at the dormitory of a restaurant in Sendai where she worked for three months until February 1996.

Since then her whereabouts has been unknown as she has not contacted her parents in her hometown in Fukushima Prefecture.

Many other high-ranking members of the cult had been on the run with female followers.

Yasuo Hayashi, 54, a high-ranking cultist who carried out the deadly subway gassing in March 1995 was with a 42-year-old female former cult member when they were arrested on Ishigaki Island, Okinawa Prefecture, in December 1996, 19 months after he was placed on a wanted list.

Hayashi, now a death row inmate, had disappeared after receiving about 1 million yen from the cult. Before going to Okinawa Prefecture, he had been hiding in a Kyoto apartment, and the woman worked at a bar in the city's Gion district to finance his living expenses.

Katsuya Takahashi, 53, and Naoko Kikuchi, 40, who are still on the run, are suspected of having hidden in an apartment in Tokorozawa, Saitama Prefecture, with other suspects, until November 1996. The room was used by the cult as a hideout.

Satoru Hirata, 46, who carried out the abduction of Kiyoshi Kariya, former chief clerk at a notary public's office, was found staying at an apartment in Maebashi, Gunma Prefecture, with a 52-year-old female cult follower in October 1995 and was arrested.

A high-ranking police officer explained that these cult members were helped by women to escape from police and hide.

"People tend to pay less attention to a man living with a woman and a couple can rent an apartment more easily than single people. In many cases, women worked to earn money to cover the men's living expenses to help them hide," he said.

Woman arrested for harboring AUM fugitive says they tried to blend into city crowds

By ("The Mainichi Daily News," January 12, 2012)

Extracted from http://wwrn.org/articles/36779/

Japan - A woman under arrest for harboring former senior AUM Shinrikyo cult member Makoto Hirata has told investigators that they attempted to melt into the crowd in big cities in an attempt to hide from police, investigative sources said.

"We tried to melt into big cities and hide," Akemi Saito, 49, also a former cult member, was quoted as telling investigators during questioning. "I thought we'd be unlikely to be noticed because there are so many people in big cities."

The pair disappeared from Sendai in February 1996 as the police dragnet was getting close to them. The Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) suspects that they fled to Osaka where it was easier to blend into the crowd.

Saito is believed to have worked at a Japanese restaurant in Sendai under a false name from November 1995 to February 1996, and lived at an apartment complex for its employees with Hirata, 46, according to the sources.

MPD investigators spotted Saito in Tokyo on Feb. 15, 1996 and tailed her, but lost sight of her near JR Shinjuku Station. The following day, she tendered her resignation to the operator of the Sendai restaurant and disappeared while leaving two pairs of bedding and other belongings at her apartment. Investigators suspect that she noticed she was tailed by the investigators in Tokyo.

Lawyer Taro Takimoto who accompanied Saito as she turned herself in to the MPD quoted her as telling him, "Whenever we felt people around us might notice our identities, we moved to another place and changed our false names."

The apartment in Higashi-Osaka, where she had been living until recently, was rented by an osteopathy clinic where she had worked under a false name.

Hirata, wanted for his alleged role in the abduction of the chief clerk of a notary public's office, resulting in the victim's death, turned himself in to the MPD on New Year's Eve after spending nearly 17 years as a fugitive. He was arrested the following day.

AZERBAIJAN: Religious minorities want religious freedom

By Felix Corley ("Forum 18," August 14, 2006)

Extracted from http://wwrn.org/articles/22414/?&place=caucasus&section=legislation

Baku, Azerbaijan - As Azerbaijan prepares amendments to its Religion Law, religious communities have told Forum 18 News Service of their widely differing views on this. The state-approved Caucasian Muslim Board wants more restrictions, as the current Law "gives great possibilities to all kinds of destructive and totalitarian sects and pseudo-religions" – although its spokesman repeatedly could not name any such Azeri group. In sharp contrast, religious minorities Forum 18 has spoken to want religious freedom. The major changes they want are: the end of compulsory censorship of religious literature; the removal of practical and legal barriers, such as a requirement that non-Muslim communities have a centre abroad to which they are subject; and an end to the ban on foreigners conducting "missionary activity". They have also told Forum 18 that they want an end to officials' arbitrary powers to interpret the law to restrict religious freedom, or to invent restrictions without any foundation in law.

As Azerbaijan prepares amendments to the country's Religion Law, views among religious communities as to how the Law needs to be changed vary widely. The state-approved Caucasian Muslim Board, Azerbaijan's largest religious community, has told Forum 18 News Service it wants a more restrictive law.

In sharp contrast, all the religious minorities Forum 18 has spoken to say they want an end to restrictions on religious freedom, both within the Religion Law and in the way officials nationally and locally implement the law. The major changes they would like to see are the ending of compulsory prior censorship of all religious literature, the removal of provisions and practices that make registration of communities the government does not like impossible, and an end to the ban on foreigners conducting "missionary activity".

Rabiyyat Aslanova, a deputy of the Milli Mejlis (Parliament) who chairs the working group preparing the amendments, told Forum 18 that she expects the draft to be completed by September, opened up to public discussion and then presented to the Milli Mejlis. She would not explain what changes are being planned, or clearly explain why she considers that the Religion Law needs changing.

Haji Akif Agaev, who speaks for the state-approved Caucasian Muslim Board, insists that the current law needs "correction". "Law is such a thing that it constantly needs rewriting in accordance with the needs of the times," he told Forum 18 from Baku on 8 August. "The Religion Law should reflect current realities and should ensure that everyone can fulfil his or her religious needs. But religion should not be used for other purposes – or against others. The Religion Law should meet the demands of the people and the country."

Both Deputy Aslanova and Agil Hajiev, of the State Committee for Work with Religious Organisations, made similarly vague statements about why changes are being planned.

Although Haji Akif said that the Board could not give concrete recommendations on any changes until it sees the draft amendments, he insisted that the Law must be tightened. "Today's law gives great possibilities to all kinds of destructive and totalitarian sects and pseudo-religions," he claimed. "There's no mechanism in the current law to tackle them, as exist in other European laws." He could not name any countries which have such mechanisms, and repeatedly refused to name any destructive sects that he believes function in Azerbaijan.

Given his repeated refusal to name the groups he had in mind, Forum 18 asked if he meant Muslim or non-Muslim groups, to which he responded: "Both." On the tenth request to name such groups, he would only specify Aum Shinrikyo, the Japanese cult responsible for the fatal attack on Japan's Tokyo Metro in 1995. Forum 18 is unaware that this or any similar group has any adherents in Azerbaijan.

Like Deputy Aslanova and Agil Hajiev of the State Committee for Work with Religious Organisations, Haji Akif of the Caucasian Muslim Board rejected the description of the mandatory prior approval of religious literature as censorship. "It is a normal procedure to examine what literature is being produced or brought into the country".

Religious minorities Forum 18 has spoken to are unequivocal in calling for an end to discrimination in the Law and in practice. Although the current Law specifies that all religions are equal and that citizens have equal rights regardless of their religious affiliation, Ilya Zenchenko, head of the Baptist Union, insists this must be strengthened in the new Law. "Islam is considered the national faith," he told Forum 18 from Baku on 8 August. "Rafik Aliev, the former head of the State Committee, used to regard Azerbaijan as an Islamic state. He wrote a book on religion and more than 95 percent was devoted to Islam. Only two pages covered Christianity, with Judaism getting only slightly more space."

Zenchenko called for an end, in the registration process, to the requirement that non-Muslim communities have a centre abroad to which they are subject. "This is a very strange provision. Baptists are an international brotherhood, and this is good. But we're not subordinate to anyone," he insisted. Ramazan Askarov, secretary of Baku's Baha'i community, shares this view. "If you want to establish a centre, why not? But this should be a decision for the religious community itself," he told Forum 18 on 9 August. "It's not logical for the state to require this."

Another Protestant pastor - who asked not to be identified as he was speaking in his own name, not in that of his church - agreed. "You can't get registration until you get a denomination, but you can't get a denomination until you have a centre abroad," he told Forum 18 from Baku on 8 August. "Why not? What if you don't have a centre abroad that you're subject to? What if you're just a few people getting together to worship?"

The Baku-based pastor also complained about the way registration is implemented. The regulations setting out the procedure require a "religious centre" to apply for any individual community's registration, as well as requiring that the ten founding members need to present a document from their place of work. "It's funny: all ten founders need to get a special paper from where they live and where they work," the pastor told Forum 18. "This means you have to tell your employer that you are a founder of a religious organisation. As well as potentially bringing problems for you, it violates the Constitution as your religious affiliation is confidential. This must be corrected."

Askarov of the Baha'i community complained that one Deputy had declared, in Parliament this summer (2006), that in the new Law registration should be made more difficult, not less. He attributed registration denials and bans on activity – as for the Baha'i community in the exclave of Nakhichevan [Naxçivan], where no religious minority communities are allowed to function or register – to the initiative of local officials, rather than national laws. "The Religion Law says we can have registration in Nakhichevan, but local officials don't allow it," he explained.

Nakhichevan, an exclave between Armenia, Turkey and Iran, has long had the reputation as the area with the most repressive authorities in Azerbiajan.

All religious minorities Forum 18 spoke to were unanimous that prior compulsory censorship of all religious literature produced in Azerbaijan or imported into the country must be abolished as part of the amendments. "We have to ask permission from the State Committee for any literature – we would like that removed," Askarov of the Baha'i community told Forum 18.

Zenchenko of the Baptist Union pointed out the absurdity of the censorship system. He recounted how the Cathedral of Praise Protestant church had obtained permission from the State Committee to import copies of a book two years ago, but when the Baptists wanted to import the same book the Committee said they would have to submit a copy to it separately for a new expert analysis. "Such artificial obstructions have been introduced by the State Committee – they've introduced the strict controls that exist now. I can't even receive Bibles sent to me by post".

The current Religion Law appears to allow only registered religious centres to establish educational institutions - and even then a maximum of one per denomination. Only registered religious centres can apparently establish religious publishing houses – and all literature they produce must be subjected to prior censorship.

Some religious minorities demand the removal of the ban on foreigners from conducting "religious propaganda", though others seem less concerned by this, or by the fines or deportation prescribed in the Code of Administrative Offences for those violating this ban. "It's bad that foreigners are banned from conducting missionary activity," the Baku-based Protestant pastor told Forum 18. "We're moving towards democracy, so people – whether locals or foreigners – should be free to express their views."

Aja-Das, who leads Baku's Hare Krishna community, complained of the onerous system for inviting foreigners on a "normal working visit" to give lectures to the community. "We have to invite them through the State Committee and the Foreign Ministry," he told Forum 18 from Baku on 8 August. "There are a lot of checks and it takes a lot of effort. If only it could be easier".

But Zenchenko of the Baptists was less concerned. "I'm not too worried by this ban on foreigners involved in missionary activity – we're strong enough to do this on our own," he told Forum 18. Askarov of the Baha'is said his community has not suffered as a result of this ban.

Askarov also called for provisions in the law to ban incitement to attack people of other faiths. Some parts of the media in Azerbaijan have a record of participating in the state's intolerance of religious minorities.

Forum 18 was unable to get the views on the proposed new law of the Russian Orthodox Diocese of Baku and the Caspian, which has six parishes within Azerbaijan. "Bishop Aleksandr is away from Azerbaijan at the moment and without his blessing no-one can comment," Fr Mefody, Diocesan Secretary, told Forum 18 from Baku on 11 August.

In addition to seeking changes to the religion law to end obstructions to religious practice, religious minorities would also like the authorities to end arbitrary powers of national and local officials to interpret the law in ways that restrict religious freedom or to invent restrictions which have no foundation in law.

Among such inventions are the restriction of religious communities that function without registration and restriction of the functioning of a religious community to the city or town where it is registered. "We can only get registration in Baku," Aja-Das of the Hare Krishna community told Forum 18. "We want to work in the whole country, not just in Baku." He cited continuing restrictions on Hare Krishna work outside the capital. "In some places we have been stopped from distributing literature. It wouldn't be bad if this was changed so that religious communities can work across the country."

Protestants and members of other faiths have encountered frequent similar bans in small towns and villages.

BELARUS: Renewed pressure on Baptists

By Geraldine Fagan ("Forum 18," February 8, 2008)

Extracted from http://wwrn.org/articles/27735/?&place=belarus-ukraine&section=church-state

Minsk, Belarus - Belarus has stepped up pressure on the Baptist Council of Churches, issuing a spate of fines for unregistered religious activity, Forum 18 News Service observes. The Council's congregations reject state registration in post-Soviet countries, believing that it leads to government interference. One of those recently prosecuted, Nikolai Varushin, told Forum 18: "This is our path; we are prepared to suffer for our faith. We just pray that our people will remain true to the Lord." In defiance of international human rights standards, Belarus is the only country in Europe to ban unregistered religious activity. While not including Baptists among their number, the judge in one of the recent cases, Aleksei Belotsky, told Forum 18 that the state regulates religious activity to protect citizens from "destructive sects". The increased pressure on Protestants coincides with a number of prominent public statements on the religious situation in Belarus by state officials. For example, Leonid Gulyako, Plenipotentiary for Religious and Ethnic Affairs, recently announced that in 2008 "measures will be activated to prevent the spread of neo-cults and pseudo-religions."



Belarus has stepped up pressure on congregations of the Baptist Council of Churches in recent months, Forum 18 News Service observes. "This is our path; we are prepared to suffer for our faith," explained one of those recently prosecuted for religious activity, Nikolai Varushin. "We just pray that our people will remain true to the Lord." The Baptist Council of Churches broke away from the Soviet-recognised Baptist Union in 1961. It continues to renounce state registration in post-Soviet countries, believing that it leads to government interference. In defiance of international human rights standards, Belarus is the only country in Europe to ban unregistered religious activity.

Other active Protestant churches - particularly prominent charismatic churches – are also experiencing increased state pressure. One of these churches, New Life Church in the capital Minsk, has voted to opt for civil disobedience as a response to state pressure (see F18News 7 February 2008 http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=1084).

One Baptist, Viktor Yevtyukhov, faced charges at Lelchitsy District Court (Gomel [Homyel'] Region) on 6 February because "fellow believers (..) come to his house in order to pray to God." The local authorities also demanded the removal of a prayer house sign from the building, according to the Baptist Council of Churches. Yevtyukhov refuses to comply "because he wishes everyone to know that this house belongs to a believer and anyone who wishes may come here to talk about God and pray." Yevtyukhov has been fined for religious activity before (see F18News 3 February 2004http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=243).

Judge Aleksei Belotsky stressed to Forum 18 on 7 February that he had fined Yevtukhov the minimum possible sum of 350,000 Belarusian Roubles (880 Norwegian Kroner, 110 Euros or 163 US Dollars), or roughly half the average monthly wage. By not using his home according to its designation of living accommodation, he explained, Yevtukhov is breaching Article 21.16, Part 1 of the Administrative Violations Code. Although Yevtukhov appealed to constitutional religious freedom guarantees during the 6 February hearing, "no one is violating his religious freedom," the judge insisted. He said he had pointed out to Yevtukhov that, while religious rites may take place at home, the 2002 Religion Law stipulates that they cannot be systematic or large-scale unless in a designated place of worship. "Every state has its rules - and we have to follow them," Belotsky remarked to Forum 18.

On Wednesday, 19 December 2007, a local police officer and town official entered a private home in Kostyukovka (Gomel Region) and took the names and addresses of the five women and one man holding a service there. The state representatives ordered them to remove an "Evangelical Christian Prayer House" sign from the building and to register the 18-strong church, the Baptist Council of Churches stated. On 15 January, Gomel's Railway District Court handed down a fine of 175,000 Belarusian Roubles (449 Norwegian Kroner, 56 Euros or 82 US Dollars) – almost the average weekly wage - to Nikolai Varushin of the congregation for leading an unregistered religious organisation.

Nikolai Varushin does not intend to pay the fine, "because we don't consider ourselves guilty of any crime," he told Forum 18 on 4 February. He was not surprised by it, however. "Our church functioned in the Soviet period and then we had a period of relative freedom," he explained. "Now we are still able to gather and preach, but things like this happen sometimes. We believe the Lord allows it, to keep us awake."

Another Baptist Council of Churches member, Lyudmila Yermalitskaya, stands accused of hosting "a religious event (a gathering of a group of believers, Bible reading)" at her home in Bobruisk [Babruysk] (Mogilev [Mahilyow] Region) and so breaching Article 9.9, Part 1 of the Administrative Violations Code (formation and leadership of a religious organisation without state registration). A court hearing has been set for 12 February. In the charges drawn up against Yermalitskaya, Irina Kot, the chief specialist at Bobruisk's Ideological Department notes Yermalitskaya's defence that she may not form or lead a religious organisation in line with Biblical teaching (Acts 6:3-6, which she takes to describe the founders of a new Christian community as all being male). Kot argues, however, that the fact of the violation was established by a "collective visit" to Yermalitskaya's home by seven state representatives on 19 December 2007, the Baptist Council of Churches stated on 7 February.

In a more positive development, the 24 August 2007 fine handed down to Viktor Orekhov for religious activity has been annulled (see F18News 14 September 2007 http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=1018). Brest Regional Court noted that the Baptist's "violation" took place on 22 June 2007, more than two months before the legal prosecution deadline, the Baptist Council of Churches stated on 6 February.

Lyudmila Yermalitskaya's is the fifth such case in two months. On 14 December three Council of Churches members in Baranovichi [Baranavichy] (Brest Region) were fined a total of 840,000 Belarusian Roubles (2,143 Norwegian Kroner, 169 Euros or 386 US Dollars), or over a month's average wages (see F18News 17 December 2007http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=1063). On 21 December Pastor Yuri Kravchuk of the Council of Churches congregation in Grodno was fined 140,000 Belarusian Roubles (357 Norwegian Kroner, 45 Euros or 64 US Dollars) (see F18News 11 January 2008 http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=1070).

Up until 2004, fines for unregistered religious activity were usually relatively low - equivalent to several days' average wages - and for the most part encountered by congregations of the Baptist Council of Churches. They and other unregistered independent Protestant churches stated 17 such fines in 2003 to 2004. While the analogous figure for 2005 to 2006 is 12, those fines were on several occasions significantly higher – ranging from the then equivalent of two weeks' to two months' average wages.

The increased pressure on Protestants comes at the same time as a number of prominent public statements on the religious situation in Belarus by government representatives. "Religious issues always lie within the field of activity of the KGB because they are very delicate issues," the secret police force's Chairman told journalists in Minsk on 19 December 2007. In the coming year, "measures will be activated to prevent the spread of neo-cults and pseudo-religions," Leonid Gulyako, Plenipotentiary for Religious and Ethnic Affairs, announced at a 22 January staff meeting, Interfax news agency reported.

A secret ruling by Gulyako's predecessor body, the State Committee for Religious and Ethnic Affairs, denies state registration to 12 "destructive sects", including Aum Shinrikyo and Satanists as well as Ahmadiya Muslims. While registered and not on this list, a March 2000 analysis of a Minsk-based charismatic church by an expert at the State Committee nevertheless concludes that it is a "neo-mystical religious-political destructive sect" whose growth poses "a significant threat to the individual, society and state" (see F18News 4 November 2003http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=186).

Aleksei Belotsky, the Lelchitsy District Court judge in the case of Viktor Yevtyukhov, stressed to Forum 18 that he did not regard the Baptist Council of Churches as a "destructive sect". However, Judge Belotsky did maintain that it is to protect citizens from "destructive sects" that the state regulates religious activity.

Belarusian state officials tend to regard Protestant communities generally as both ideologically and spiritually damaging (see 8 August 2006 http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=824) and as the major source of religious-political dissent (see 29 November 2006 http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=880). Dissent is not limited to Protestants, as Catholics, Orthodox and Protestants have joined together in a nationwide campaign to gather signatures calling for a change to Belarus' restrictive Religion Law (see F18News 16 May 2007http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=957).