Tokyo, Japan - Lawyers for the former leader of a doomsday cult, seeking to save their client's life, urged a Tokyo court on Thursday to reverse its rejection of an appeal of a death sentence for the man accused of masterminding a 1995 gas attack on the Tokyo subway.
The Tokyo High Court said on Monday that defence lawyers for Shoko Asahara had failed to meet a deadline for filing the appeal, and it rejected their argument that he was mentally unfit to proceed with the process.
The court's decision could pave the way for Asahara, whose real name is Chizuo Matsumoto, to be hanged for his role in masterminding the nerve gas attack that killed 12 and made thousands ill.
A spokesman for the Tokyo High Court said it was not clear when the court would make a decision or whether it would accept the lawyers' request.
Asahara, 51, was found guilty of responsibility for the gas attack and sentenced to death by the Tokyo District Court in February 2004.
The Tokyo High Court said last month that Asahara has been found mentally fit to continue his appeal.
But Asahara's lawyers had argued that the former guru of Aum Shinri Kyo, or Supreme Truth Sect, was incompetent, and they had requested that the case be suspended.
Asahara's lawyers said their client has been unable to speak or to communicate with them and should be moved to a hospital for treatment of his mental condition.
The gas attack on Tokyo rush-hour trains on March 20, 1995, injured about 5,500 people, some permanently, when members of the cult released sarin, first developed by Nazi Germany.
The gassing, with its images of bodies lying across platforms and soldiers in gas masks sealing off Tokyo subway stations, stunned the Japanese public and shattered the country's self-image as a haven of public safety.
Asahara was also found guilty of other charges including a series of crimes that killed 15 people.
Asahara set up the cult in 1987, mixing Buddhist and Hindu meditation with apocalyptic teachings and attracting, at its peak, at least 10,000 members in Japan and overseas, including graduates of some of the nation's elite universities.
The pudgy, nearly blind guru had predicted that the United States would attack Japan and turn it into a nuclear wasteland.
Aum Shinri Kyo, which admitted involvement in the gassing, later changed its name to Aleph, the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Its leaders insist that the cult is now benign, but Japanese authorities still keep its membership of about 1,600 under surveillance.
Asahara's lawyers were required to present their case for an appeal in August but had refused to take the step, saying Asahara was mentally incompetent, but they reversed their position last week, according to media reports.
Tokyo, Japan - A Japanese court rejected a former cult leader's appeal of his death sentence for the 1995 nerve gas attack on the Tokyo subways and other killings, Japanese media reported Monday.
Tokyo's High Court threw out the appeal by Shoko Asahara, former guru of the Aum Shinrikyo cult, because his lawyers failed to file papers on time, national broadcaster NHK said.
His lawyers had refused to submit the papers because they argued Asahara suffers from pathological mental stress caused by confinement and is unfit for trial.
Asahara, born Chizuo Matsumoto, was convicted in 2004 and sentenced to hang for the Tokyo attack and others that killed 27 people and injured thousands of others.
In the subway attack, cult members released lethal sarin nerve gas on trains converging in central Tokyo in March 1995. The fumes killed 12 people and sent thousands to the hospital.
The nearly blind former cult leader, who once commanded a powerful group of some 40,000 members, mumbled incoherently during his eight-year trial, interrupting sessions with bizarre outbursts in English.
But last month, a court-appointed psychiatrist submitted a report to the Tokyo High Court saying Asahara may be feigning mental illness and "had not lost the ability to stand trial."
Lawyers could still appeal the High Court decision to Japan's Supreme Court, but Asahara could hang if the top court sides with the earlier decision, NHK said.
About a dozen other cult leaders have been sentenced to death, although none of them have been hanged, and three cultists wanted in the subway gassing are still on the run.
The charismatic Asahara had predicted an apocalypse that only cult members would survive. The cult - which at its height claimed 40,000 members in Japan and Russia - was developing chemical, biological and conventional weapons in an apparent attempt to attack population centers and overthrow the government.
The cult, which has regrouped and is now named Aleph, has about 6,500 members and is under surveillance by Japan's Public Safety Agency.
Tokyo, Japan - Victims of incidents related to AUM Shinrikyo cult founder Shoko Asahara on Monday backed a high court's rejection of his appeal against the death sentence while some questioned it, calling on authorities to give him a further chance to account for the cases.
Shizue Takahashi, who lost her husband in the 1995 sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway system, one of the 13 cases which Asahara was charged with, said it was "good" for the Tokyo High Court to reject his appeal.
"It's (already) been 11 years since the incident. The elapsed time is too long for a person who has lost a beloved relative" although it may have been necessary to take that long, given the sheer number of cases and defendants involved, Takahashi said.
Taro Takimoto, a lawyer who helps victims of AUM-related incidents, said the rejection of the appeal was "inevitable" because the defense had failed to present the required papers before the court-mandated deadline in August last year.
Tomoyuki Oyama, who lost his daughter in the 1989 murder of the entire family of anti-AUM lawyer Tsutsumi Sakamoto in Yokohama, said, "It was a logical conclusion. I believe it was really good, a reasonable decision."
The court on Monday rejected an appeal filed by the defense counsel of Asahara, born Chizuo Matsumoto, increasing the likelihood that his death sentence will stand without an appeal court hearing.
Lawyer Hisashi Okada, one of Sakamoto's former colleagues, said he was dissatisfied with the high court's rejection on procedural grounds because it means the judicial authorities have effectively closed the doors on efforts to get to the bottom of the crimes.
"I wanted the man to tell the truth about a series of incidents which claimed many people's life. In that sense, I still feel discontent," Okada said.
Video journalist Tatsuya Mori who directed documentary films on the cult, called "A" and "A2," urged the people concerned to take steps to cure the mental illnesses Asahara is believed to have as psychiatric doctors have said they are curable.
"It was abominable to terminate a trial citing a delay in procedures," Mori said.
Tokyo, Japan - Tokyo subway workers and victims' families paused for a silent prayer on Monday to mark the 11th anniversary of a doomsday cult's nerve gas attack in the rail network - Japan's deadliest-ever urban terrorism assault.
Fifteen employees at Kasumigaseki station, one of the sites that suffered the worst damage, laid flowers at a memorial and observed silence at the moment of the attack during morning rush hour on March 20, 1995.
Shizue Takahashi, whose husband was one of two subway personnel killed, also laid flowers and prayed.
Members of the Aum Shinrikyo cult, riding five trains converging on the Japanese capital's government district, released sarin nerve gas, leaving 12 people dead and thousands injured.
Later on Monday, survivors and victims' families, along with their lawyers and supporters, will hold a separate memorial service to address issues involving the victims' rights, organizers said.
Cult leader Shoko Asahara was sentenced to death in 2004 for masterminding the attack and 12 other crimes that claimed a total of 27 lives.
His lawyers appealed the ruling, but argued that he was unfit for trial and demanded psychiatric tests, claiming Asahara suffers from pathological mental stress caused by confinement.
Last month, a court-appointed psychiatrist submitted a report to the Tokyo High Court saying Asahara may be feigning mental illness and "had not lost the ability to stand trial." Prosecutors have since asked the court to throw out Asahara's appeal.
The final decision of whether to start trial is pending.
Toyko, Japan - A former senior member of the cult formerly called AUM Shinrikyo appealed Thursday a high court's decision that upheld the death sentence handed down against him for his involvement in a series of crimes including the deadly sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway system in 1995, his defense lawyers said.
The lawyers claim that capital punishment is too heavy for Tomomitsu Niimi, 42, saying he was the most loyal apprentice to AUM founder Shoko Asahara and had no option but to follow his instructions.
The Tokyo High Court upheld Wednesday a district court's death penalty against Niimi, with the presiding judge saying the defendant had not been put in any extreme circumstances.
Niimi was the only follower of Asahara to have been charged in all seven murder cases in which the cult was involved.
Niimi was found guilty of conspiring with Asahara and other AUM members to release the toxic gas on five subway trains in Tokyo on March 20, 1995, in an attack that left 12 people dead and more than 5,000 injured.
He was also involved in spraying sarin on June 27, 1994, in a residential area in Matsumoto, Nagano Prefecture, which killed seven people and seriously injured four others, as well as the Nov. 4, 1989, murders of lawyer Tsutsumi Sakamoto, his wife and their 1-year-old son in Yokohama, the court said.
The cult has renamed itself Aleph.
Tokyo, Japan - Tokyo's High Court on Wednesday upheld a death penalty for a doomsday cult member convicted in the 1995 Tokyo subway nerve gassing that killed 12 people, a court official said.
Tomomitsu Niimi, a high-ranking member of the Aum Shinrikyo cult, was sentenced in 2002 to hang for murdering 26 people in seven separate attacks.
The court official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of court rules, had no other details of the decision on his appeal.
Niimi gained notoriety at the start of his trial in 1996 by refusing to enter pleas and pledging eternal loyalty to former cult leader Shoko Asahara, who was sentenced to die in 2004 but who is also appealing.
Niimi has denied involvement in the Tokyo subway attack but reportedly has admitted to other charges brought against him, saying he was following Asahara's orders.
Cult members released the lethal sarin nerve gas on subway trains converging in central Tokyo in March 1995. The fumes killed 12 people and sent thousands to the hospital.
Niimi also was convicted of helping organize the 1989 strangulation of lawyer Tsutsumi Sakamoto -- one of the first people to publicly question the cult's activities -- and the lawyer's wife and son.
Judge Kunio Harada said in his ruling that Niimi, as a senior member of the cult, was "highly responsible for each crime," Kyodo News agency reported.
The charismatic Asahara had predicted an apocalypse that only cult members would survive. The cult -- which at its height claimed 40,000 members in Japan and Russia -- was developing chemical, biological and conventional weapons in an apparent attempt to attack population centers and overthrow the government.
The cult was declared bankrupt in March 1996, but later regrouped under the name Aleph. It is under surveillance by Japan's Public Safety Agency, which has warned that the group remains a threat.
Tokyo, Japan - A private junior high school in Saitama Prefecture has refused to enroll a son of Shoko Asahara, founder of the religious cult formerly known as AUM Shinrikyo, Asahara's lawyers said Thursday.
Asahara's second son, 11, passed an entrance exam for Kasukabe Kyoei Junior High School in Kasukabe, Saitama Prefecture, in January and has already paid admission fees, the lawyers said.
But the boy was denied entry to the school in February after it found out his father is Asahara, 51, who has been sentenced to death for his role in 13 criminal cases including the 1995 sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway system, the lawyers said.
The school's principal, Hideki Yaguchi, said, "We don't have any in-house rules on entry denial, but we took the action as we could not show that the son is not under the cult's influence."
"As a school, we want to maintain an environment in which other students and their parents feel safe, and can concentrate on studying," Yaguchi said.
Asahara, whose real name is Chizuo Matsumoto, was sentenced to death by the Tokyo District Court in February 2004. He has appealed the ruling to the Tokyo High Court in which he is currently on trial.
In a similar move, Wako University in Machida, Tokyo, refused to enroll Asahara's third daughter, 22, in March 2004 after she passed an entrance exam.
She filed a lawsuit with the Tokyo District Court, which last month ordered the university to pay her 300,000 yen in damages.
AUM Shinrikyo has renamed itself Aleph.
Toyko, Japan - The defense counsel for Shoko Asahara, founder of the cult formerly known as AUM Shinrikyo, asked the Tokyo High Court on Wednesday for an open hearing with the psychiatrist who examined him and determined he was fit to stand trial.
The lawyers also sought a reexamination of the mental state of their defendant, who they say is in a state of serious mental disorder and cannot stand trial, and recommended two psychiatrists to undertake the task.
The defense attached a written opinion by Haruo Akimoto, a former University of Tokyo professor who met Asahara in February, who says the psychiatric report presented to the high court last month by psychiatrist Akira Nishiyama is wrong.
Akimoto is one of six psychiatrists the lawyers had asked to examine Asahara, whose real name is Chizuo Matsumoto. They said they will also submit similar documents by the other five once they are ready.
Nishiyama says in the report, which he compiled at the request of the Tokyo High Court and submitted to it on Feb. 20, that Asahara has kept silent of his own free will and suggests he is mentally competent to stand trial.
The report says Nishiyama interviewed Asahara, observed his behavior and did physiotherapy checks three times at the Tokyo Detention House on Sept. 26, Oct. 5 and Dec. 12 last year.
Asahara, who turns 51 on Thursday, was sentenced to death at the Tokyo District Court in February 2004 for his role in 13 criminal cases, including the 1995 sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway system. He has appealed the ruling to the high court.
In his written opinion, Akimoto noted that Nishiyama said Asahara has not reached the standard of having developed a mental disorder related to incarceration but did not clarify what the standard was.
Akimoto also said the report contains an incorrect diagnosis and so its principal text should not be used.
The high court asked the defense counsel to file its opinion on Nishiyama's psychiatric report in written form by March 15.
Asahara's death sentence may stand if the high court concludes he is mentally competent, as his lawyers did not submit a statement giving the reason for the appeal by the deadline of last August. The lawyers have said they did not meet the deadline as they could not communicate with the defendant.
AUM Shinrikyo has renamed itself Aleph.
Tokyo, Japan - A key member of the doomsday cult who allegedly prepared the nerve gas for the deadly attack on the Tokyo subway in 1995, has begun an appeal on Wednesday against his death sentence.
Tomomasa Nakagawa, 43, was ordered to hang on charges of murder in 11 incidents including the subway assault, and a separate sarin gas attack by the Aum Supreme Truth cult in 1994.
His appeal opened at Tokyo High Court. The same court last week gave separate approval to go ahead with the appeal of cult founder Shoko Asahara after a psychiatrist found him mentally fit.
Thirteen former Aum members have been sentenced to death but none have been hanged so far. Only one cult member, Kazuaki Okazaki, has so far lost his final appeal against execution.
The defense lawyers said Nakagawa was not aware that the cult planned to release sarin in rush-hour Tokyo trains when he produced and packed the Nazi-invented gas.
Twelve people were killed and thousands more injured in the attack, which Asahara allegedly ordered in hopes of pre-empting a police raid on the cult.
The defense also said Nakagawa was only present to treat other Aum members from chemicals during the cult's first sarin attack in 1994.
Seven bystanders died when the cult spread the gas in the central city of Matsumoto in an experiment ahead of the subway atrocity.
Nakagawa along with Okazaki was also convicted of involvement in the murders of an anti-sect lawyer, the lawyer's wife and their one-year-old child.
The Tokyo District Court had found Nakagawa guilty on all 11 counts, with the judge saying: "The fact that total 25 people died in the attacks he took part in easily overwhelms the leniency that he deserves."
Toyko, Japan - The public prosecutors requested the Tokyo High Court on Friday to dismiss an appeal filed by Shoko Asahara, founder of the cult formerly known as AUM Shinrikyo, against a death sentence to him.
The court should dismiss the appeal because Asahara's defense team had not submitted to the court a document stating the reason for the appeal before the stipulated deadline, and because the court's psychiatric examination had found him mentally competent to undergo court proceedings, the prosecutors said.
Asahara was tried, found guilty and sentenced to death for a number of crimes committed by AUM, including the March 1995 Tokyo subway sarin gas attack.
Tokyo, Japan - A defense lawyer for the former leader of a Japanese doomsday cult on Tuesday disputed a report by a court-appointed psychiatrist that said his client was competent to stand an appeals trial.
The report, based on a psychiatric evaluation, found that Shoko Asahara, sentenced to hang for his role in masterminding a 1995 subway gas attack on the Tokyo subway, was mentally capable of standing trial.
Asahara, whose real name is Chizuo Matsumoto, was found guilty of responsibility for the nerve gas attack that killed 12 and sickened thousands, and was sentenced to death by a Tokyo court in February 2004.
``The report said that Asahara was capable of communicating, but we have never had a conversation with him,'' said Akio Matsushita, one of Asahara's lawyers.
``Whenever we meet him, he seems to be talking to somebody who isn't in the room, grunting and nodding or laughing,'' he added. ``There's no way that he can stand trial.''
The results of the psychiatric evaluation clear the way for the Tokyo High Court either to proceed with the appeal, where Asahara's death sentence is widely expected to be upheld, or to dismiss it, thus finalising the verdict, media said.
The report acknowledged that Asahara had developed some prison-related symptoms, but added he ``does not suffer mental problems and he is able to communicate,'' Kyodo news agency reported. ``He has not lost his litigation capacity.''
Matsushita said Asahara's defense team was having him examined by another psychiatrist, who would submit a report by March 15.
The court could dismiss the appeal since defense lawyers missed a deadline for presenting a summary of their case. A decision could come next month, Japanese media said.
Asahara's lawyers said in November that the former guru has been unable to speak or to communicate with them and should be moved to a hospital for treatment for his mental condition.
They said that Asahara was incontinent, wore diapers and used a wheelchair, and that evaluations by psychiatrists hired by the defense team showed he may be suffering from a brain disorder.
According to the Yomiuri Shimbun daily, however, a High Court judge who met with Asahara in December 2004 said he nodded and seemed to understand the content of the discussion.
Quoting a report from the Tokyo Detention House, where Asahara is confined, the Yomiuri added that on the night he was sentenced to death, Asahara screamed ``Damn you!'' from his cell.
The Tokyo High Court had rejected the defense's initial request to suspend the case, but had appointed a psychiatrist to conduct an evaluation on Asahara.
The defense team has criticised the court for refusing to recognize Asahara's illness and rushing to move on with the trial, saying the court was keen to finalize the death sentence.
About 5,500 people were injured, some permanently, when members of the cult released sarin, first developed by Nazi Germany, in Tokyo rush-hour trains on March 20, 1995.
Matsushita said he was not hopeful of the court's decision.
``I would say it's virtually a given that they'll decide to proceed with the appeal,'' he added.
Tokyo, Japan - The former leader of a Japanese doomsday cult sentenced to hang for masterminding a 1995 fatal gas attack on Tokyo subways has been found to be mentally fit to continue his appeal, Japanese media said on Monday, quoting a report by a court-appointed psychiatrist.
Lawyers for Shoko Asahara had argued that the 50-year-old ex-head of Aum Shinri Kyo (Supreme Truth Sect) was incompetent and had requested that the case be suspended.
Asahara, whose real name is Chizuo Matsumoto, was found guilty of responsibility for the nerve gas attack that killed 12 and sickened thousands, and was sentenced to death by a Tokyo court in February 2004.
The results of the psychiatric evaluation clear the way for the Tokyo High Court either to proceed with the appeal, where Asahara's death sentence is widely expected to be upheld, or to dismiss it, thus finalising the verdict, media said.
The report acknowledged that Asahara had developed some prison-related symptoms, but added he "does not suffer mental problems and he is able to communicate," Kyodo news agency reported. "He has not lost his litigation capacity."
A court spokesman confirmed that the report had been submitted but declined to give details, saying the court was still examining the contents.
The court could now dismiss the appeal since defense lawyers had missed a deadline for presenting a summary of their case. A decision could come next month, Japanese media said.
Asahara's lawyers said in November that the former guru has been unable to speak or to communicate with them and should be moved to a hospital for treatment for his mental condition.
They said that Asahara was incontinent, wore diapers and used a wheelchair, and that evaluations by psychiatrists hired by the defense team had shown he may be suffering from a brain disorder.
Incoherent remarks
The Tokyo High Court had rejected the defense's initial request to suspend the case, but had appointed a psychiatrist to conduct an evaluation on Asahara.
The defense team has criticised the court for refusing to recognize Asahara's illness and rushing to move on with the trial, saying the court was keen to finalize the death sentence.
About 5,500 people were injured, some permanently, when members of the cult released sarin, first developed by Nazi Germany, in Tokyo rush-hour trains on March 20, 1995.
The gassing, with its images of bodies lying across platforms and soldiers in gas masks sealing off Tokyo subway stations, stunned the Japanese public and shattered the country's self-image as a haven of public safety.
Asahara was also found guilty of other charges including a series of crimes that killed 15 people.
He pleaded not guilty but never testified and made mostly incoherent remarks in the court during the trial.
Asahara set up the cult in 1987, mixing Buddhist and Hindu meditation with apocalyptic teachings and attracting, at its peak, at least 10,000 members in Japan and overseas, among them graduates of some of the nation's elite universities.
The pudgy, nearly blind guru predicted that the United States would attack Japan and turn it into a nuclear wasteland.
Aum Shinri Kyo, which admitted involvement in the gassing, later changed its name to Aleph, the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Its leaders insist that the cult is now benign, but Japanese authorities still keep its membership of about 1,600 under surveillance.
Tokyo, Japan - The Tokyo District Court on Monday ordered the operator of Wako University to pay 300,000 yen in damages to a daughter of Shoko Asahara, founder of a religious cult formerly known as AUM Shinrikyo, saying it was illegal to deny her entry after she passed the school's entrance exam.
Presiding Judge Hiroshi Noyama said in handing down the ruling that Wako Gakuen "lacked the willingness to carefully study the situation, easily concluding that danger could arise by enrolling her and refused her entry."
The 22-year-old third daughter of Asahara, 50, had demanded 3.5 million yen.
A Wako University official said the school gravely accepts the ruling.
Asahara's daughter passed the entrance exam for the human relations study department of Wako University in Machida, western Tokyo, in early 2004, according to the ruling.
The university, however, refused to enroll her in March that year, partly because of who her father is.
Asahara, whose real name is Chizuo Matsumoto, has been sentenced to death by the Tokyo District Court for his role in 13 criminal cases, including the 1995 sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway system. He has appealed the ruling to the Tokyo High Court.
Bunkyo University, based in Tokyo, also canceled admission of his daughter in March 2004, but decided to enroll her after the court ruled the following month that she be recognized as a student of the university.
She is currently enrolled at Bunkyo University.
Tokyo, Japan - The stalled appeals trial of the cult leader accused of masterminding the deadly sarin-gas attacks in Tokyo is about to reach a crucial stage. If a court-initiated psychiatric evaluation finds 50-year-old Chizuo Matsumoto is fit to stand trial, his death sentence could move a step toward finalization depending on how his lawyers respond.
The evaluation is due to be released this month, sources said. But if Matsumoto, founder of Aum Shinrikyo, is deemed mentally unfit, the appeals trial will be suspended.
The evaluation was initiated by the Tokyo High Court in September after Matsumoto's appeal stalled because defense lawyers claimed their client was unable even to communicate.
In February 2004, the Tokyo District Court sentenced Matsumoto to death on murder and other charges. He was found guilty of masterminding the 1995 sarin attacks on the Tokyo subway system that left 12 dead as well as other crimes by his disciples. Aum Shinrikyo now calls itself Aleph.
After it reviews the report and hears from the defense team and prosecutors, the high court will decide if Matsumoto is fit to continue his appeal. If he is found fit, the defense team must give the Tokyo High Court a crucial document it has withheld since August--a summary of its reasons for appealing.
Matsumoto's attorneys have said they cannot prepare the summary because their client could not communicate with them. If the defense still refuses to produce that paper, the court could dismiss the appeal.
A dismissal could lead to the death sentence becoming final, although the defense may file an objection.
If the defense team hands in the summary, the hearings will resume, unless the court rejects the paper for missing the August deadline.
In that situation, the case would likely go on to the Supreme Court. But then, Matsumoto's lawyers would have to change tactics, as the trial would move forward on the premise that Matsumoto is mentally competent. Presiding Judge Masaru Suda agreed to the psychiatric test in order to move the stalled process forward.
In December 2004, Suda took the rare step of meeting Matsumoto in person. The judge found him capable of understanding him.
The court's evaluation has been conducted by a court-appointed psychiatrist. The same doctor in a previous case found another defendant, who is now on death row, to be mentally competent.
Because they fear the psychiatrist could decide against them, defense lawyers offered him assessments by other experts in support of their position, sources said.
Detention authorities have reported that Matsumoto recently uttered such phrases as "What are you doing, you fool?" and "Don't make a fool of me."
Tokyo, Japan - A Justice Ministry panel on Monday approved an extension of the surveillance period on the religious cult formerly known as AUM Shinrikyo for another three years from the end of this month, the panel said.
The Public Security Examination Commission has also required that the cult reports on its profit-making businesses to the Public Security Intelligence Agency performance so that the authorities can check its financial situation.
The commission said the surveillance should be continued as AUM founder Shoko Asahara, whose real name is Chizuo Matsumoto, still wields influence over the cult, which has rename itself Aleph.
Information and materials, including the outcome of the agency's on-site inspections of the cult's facilities, have suggested Asahara's lingering influence, the commission said.
The Public Security Intelligence Agency, also under the Justice Ministry, called for a three-year extension of the surveillance period in November last year, saying cult members still believe Asahara is at the summit of the hierarchic structure and that they maintain their faith and obedience in him.
The cult still retains Asahara and five others who were allegedly involved in the 1995 fatal sarin gas attack on Tokyo's subway system as its members, the agency also asserted.
The law for restricting the activities of certain groups, which went into effect in December 1999, allows the authorities to keep watch on groups that pose a threat to the public.
It stipulates that the surveillance period for such a group may be extended if, for example, someone who has engineered indiscriminate mass killings continues to have influence over the group.
The cult had called for a termination of the six-year-old surveillance saying in an interview with commission members earlier this month that reform in the group has been in progress.
The group was also opposed to the plan requiring it to report on its businesses.
The surveillance on AUM was initially imposed in January 2000 for three years and extended in January 2003.
Asahara was sentenced to death by the Tokyo District Court for his role in 13 criminal cases including the fatal sarin attack. His defense counsel has appealed to the Tokyo High Court.
Toyko, Japan - Lawyers for Shoko Asahara, founder of the Aum Shinrikyo religious cult, released portions of a psychiatrist's report Monday stating that Asahara is unable to stand trial because of his confused state of mind.
The report of Masaaki Noda, a professor at Kwansei Gakuin University, will be submitted to the Tokyo High Court, the lawyers said.
Asahara, 50, who has been sentenced to death and whose real name is Chizuo Matsumoto, is in the midst of an appeal.
Based on the report, the lawyers will ask the high court to suspend the appellate trial. Asahara has been found guilty on 13 counts, including the 1995 sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway system.
"If competency to stand trial is defined as understanding the meaning of the trial and the ability to defend oneself, then (Asahara) should be deemed lacking in such competency," Noda said in the report.
He also stated in the report that Asahara's symptoms may improve in about six months if he is given immediate psychological treatment and that reopening the trial after his recovery would be more practical than arguing over whether he is pretending to be ill or is actually confused.
Three of the four psychiatrists, including Noda, who have interviewed Asahara have expressed doubts about his competency to stand trial. Another is drafting a report stating that Asahara is suffering from a mental disorder caused by his long stay in prison.
Toyko, Japan - Hundreds of videotapes that record AUM Shinrikyo founder Shoko Asahara's sermons justifying his orders to murder people are still being kept at a cult facility, public security authorities said.
Public Security Investigation Agency officials said the finding clearly demonstrates that the cult remains loyal to Asahara. The agency intends to use the discovery as the basis for a decision it will make before the end of this month to place the cult under probation for three more years under the law regulating anti-social groups.
During a raid on the cult's facility in Saitama in July last year, agency inspectors found about 550 videotapes recording approximately 1,100 sermons Asahara delivered before the cult launched sarin gas attacks on Tokyo subway trains in March 1995, agency officials said.
Followers at the facility admitted that they are the master recordings of the guru's sermons.
Police apparently had previously failed to find the tapes during raids on the facility, agency officials said.
In some of the sermons, Asahara justifies his orders to kill people.
"You are allowed to do whatever the guru orders you to do, including murder," he said in a cult seminar in the Tanzawa district of Kanagawa Prefecture in 1987. "If the guru orders you to kill someone, it is the time for that person to die."
Following the subway attack that killed 12 people and sickened thousands of others, the cult declared that it had given up dangerous doctrines.
However, the cult has remained loyal to Asahara since cult leader Fumihiro Joyu disappeared from public appearance in October 2003 under the pretext of religious training.
Asahara, whose real name is Chizuo Matsumoto, is appealing a death sentence handed down on him for masterminding the subway gassing and other crimes committed by his followers.
Toyko, Japan - A faction of the religious cult formerly known as AUM Shinrikyo earned about 10 million yen in revenues from seminars held during the year-end and New Year holiday season, intelligence authority sources said Thursday.
About 90 followers took part in Dec. 29-Jan. 3 seminars in Funabashi in Chiba Prefecture and Osaka, which were sponsored by AUM "representative" Fumihiro Joyu for the first time in two and a half years, the sources said.
Another group led by Tatsuko Muraoka, who is ranked as the cult's "chairwoman," is believed to have collected about 30 million yen from around 260 followers who attended her seminars during the same period at different locations, the sources said.
The Muraoka group is considered to be more loyal than the Joyu group to AUM founder Shoko Asahara, whose lawyers are appealing against the death penalty handed down to him for a series of crimes including the 1995 fatal sarin gas attacks on the Tokyo subway system.
The holding of separate seminars by the cult indicates that the rivalry between the Joyu and Muraoka groups has intensified, according to the sources.
AUM has renamed itself Aleph.
Toyko, Japan - Shoko Asahara, founder of the religious cult formerly known as AUM Shinrikyo who is appealing a death sentence, is in a confused state of mind that renders him unable to follow court proceedings and needs medical treatment, a defense psychiatrist who visited him Friday said.
"He moved his eyebrows and made other movements when I spoke to him, but they were not responses based on understanding my words," Masaaki Noda, a professor at Kwansei Gakuin University, told Kyodo News.
Noda is the fourth psychiatrist appointed by the defense to meet with the 50-year-old, who has been sentenced to death for the 1995 Tokyo subway sarin gas attack and other crimes.
"He is living in a different world. It is impossible for him to comprehend a court trial and the hearings should proceed after he gets treatment," Noda said after meeting Asahara for 30 minutes with permission from the Tokyo High Court.
Noda added that treatment could be completed in a few months and that he believes Asahara's condition will improve.
The high court has also hired psychiatrists to evaluate Asahara's mental state, and the results are not expected until Feburary at the earliest.
Asahara, whose real name is Chizuo Matsumoto, was sentenced to death by the Tokyo District Court on Feb. 27, 2004, for his role in 13 crimes, including the 1995 sarin gas attack.
His defense has appealed the ruling and requested the Tokyo High Court to suspend his trial, claiming he suffers from mental disorders. But the defense did not submit the document stating reasons for the appeal by the Aug. 31 deadline last year.
As a result, judicial experts said that if the high court decides Asahara is competent to stand trial, the court may turn down the appeal without holding any hearings due to the lack of a statement as required by the Code of Criminal Procedure.
Tokyo High Court sources said last month that the outcome of psychiatric examinations commissioned by the court is expected to be known in February or later.
AUM Shinrikyo has renamed itself Aleph.
Tokyo, Japan - A detained follower of the religious cult formerly known as AUM Shinrikyo has filed a damage suit seeking 1 million yen from the state as he has not been allowed to take the collections of the sermons by its founder Shoko Asahara into his prison cell, his lawyers said Thursday.
Koichi Kitamura, who is serving a life sentence in Gifu Prison over his involvement in the 1995 sarin gas attacks on the Tokyo subway system, tried to bring in four volumes of the collection, but he was allowed to have only three as the prison regulations stipulate a prisoner can bring up to three books into his or her cell, according to the complaint.
The regulations note that certain publications, such as scriptures, dictionaries and textbooks, are not included in the three-volume limit.
Kitamura, 37, requested in March 2003 that the prison designate the collections as scriptures, but it rejected that request three months later, thereby preventing him from reading other books aside from the three, according to the complaint, filed with the Tokyo District Court.
In rejecting his request, the prison said a scripture should belong to a designated religious organization and AUM, which has renamed itself Aleph, is not considered one.
Kitamura argues it is unconstitutional for the prison to discriminate against his religious beliefs by failing to recognize AUM's religious status and by limiting the books he can read accordingly.
Asahara, 50, whose real name is Chizuo Matsumoto, was sentenced to death over various charges, including the sarin gas attack.
