Japan extends surveillance of doomsday sect
Japanese officials today said they have extended an order to keep close surveillance on the doomsday sect that released nerve gas in Tokyo’s subway system a decade ago, killing 12 people.
The Justice Ministry’s Public Security Examination Commission approved a second three-year extension of the order to watch the Aleph group – formerly called Aum Shinrikyo – said commission spokesman Noboru Matsui.
A current surveillance order expires at the end of January.
The commission extended the order because the group’s activities were still influenced by founder Shoko Asahara and others who’d been leaders in the group when the gas attacks occurred, Matsui said.
Aleph will also be required to submit reports on its income-generating activities, a Kyodo News agency report said.
The Public Security Intelligence Agency, which oversees the surveillance, filed the three-year extension request last November.
Asahara and 12 other group members have been sentenced to death for their roles in carrying out the March 1995 sarin gas attack that killed 12 people and injured thousands, but no executions have been carried out yet.
Aleph has about 1,650 members in Japan and runs 28 facilities, the Justice Ministry said. It did not specify the nature of the facilities.
At its peak, the group claimed 10,000 followers in Japan and 30,000 in Russia.
