By HIDEMASA YOSHIZAWA/ Staff Writer
March 20, 2023 at 18:47 JST
Mourners offered prayers and flowers for the victims of the 1995 sarin gas attack by the Aum Shinrikyo cult in Tokyo’s subway system.
Families and railway staff members observed a moment of silence on March 20 at Kasumigaseki Station to mark the 28th anniversary of the worst act of terrorism in Japan’s modern history, which killed 14 people and injured more than 6,000.
“I’m outraged that their (the cult's) toxic culture hasn’t changed at all,” said Shizue Takahashi, 76.
Takahashi’s husband, Kazumasa, was an assistant stationmaster at the subway station who died in the attack.
On that fateful day, Aum Shinrikyo members had used umbrellas with sharpened tips to puncture plastic bags filled with liquid sarin, releasing the deadly nerve gas into the packed commuter trains in five coordinated attacks across three subway lines.
The ceremony comes a week after authorities banned Aleph, a successor group to the doomsday cult, from using some of its facilities and receiving donations.
It marked the first time they enforced new legislation designed to keep Aum inheritors under close surveillance.
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