• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer
  • HOME
  • ABOUT CHINA
    • NEWS
    • TESTIMONIES
    • OP-EDS
    • FEATURED
    • GLOSSARY
    • CHINA PERSECUTION MAP
  • FROM THE WORLD
    • NEWS
    • OP-EDS
    • FEATURED
    • TESTIMONIES
  • INTERVIEWS
  • DOCUMENTS AND TRANSLATIONS
    • DOCUMENTS
    • THE TAI JI MEN CASE
    • TRANSLATIONS
  • EVENTS
  • ABOUT
  • EDITORIAL BOARD
  • TOPICS

Bitter Winter

A magazine on religious liberty and human rights

three friends of winter
Home / International / Featured Global

The Great Witch Hunt Against the Unification Church in Japan. 3. Creating Second-Class Citizens

11/09/2022Massimo Introvigne |

Being connected with the unpopular church is enough to be excluded from the political life and even from humanitarian activities.

by Massimo Introvigne

Article 3 of 3. Read article 1 and article 2.

Prime Minister Fumio Kishida addressing the Diet.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida addressing the Diet. Credits.

While the attempt to dissolve the Unification Church in Japan after the Abe assassination is the main cause for concern, as explained in the previous article of this series, there are other obnoxious acts of discrimination that indicate a broader climate of intolerance prevailing in Japan.

On October 26, 2022, the Liberal Democratic Party, i.e. the largest party in Japan and the main component of the governmental coalition, amended its Governance Code by including a Rule 5-4 mandating that the Party’s Diet members should not cooperate in any way with “organizations or groups whose activities raise concerns of social relevance.”

A letter sent on the same day to all Party Diet members (of which Bitter Winter has a copy) had as its subject matter “Regarding the severance of relations with the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification (former Unification Church),” clearly indicating who was targeted and singled out. The letter explained that “participating in meetings, events” and “sending congratulatory telegrams, messages, etc.” will be forbidden, as well as receiving support “for elections and political activities” from the Unification Church “and its affiliated organizations.”

On the one hand, a category of second-class Japanese citizens is created, who will not be free to participate in the political activities of the largest party simply because of their religious beliefs. On the other hand, the freedom of politicians to attend the meetings they deem fit will also be curtailed. By including “affiliated organizations” the letter implicitly refers to the Universal Peace Federation, preventing Japanese politicians from the Liberal Democratic Party to attend conferences where presidents, prime ministers, and other prominent leaders of several countries routinely speak.

Daishiro Yamagiwa, the Minister of Economic Revitalization, was forced to resign on October 24 because he had attended a meeting of a group connected with the Unification Church in Nigeria eleven years ago and had a short meeting with FFWPU leader Dr. Hak Ja Han Moon in 2018.

Compelled to resign: former Minister Daishiro Yamagiwa had a meeting with a group connected with Unification Church.
Compelled to resign: former Minister Daishiro Yamagiwa. Credits.

The attack on “affiliated organizations” connected with the Unification Church has now reached paranoid levels. Under the pressure of media and left-wing politicians, the Minister of Foreign Affairs has cancelled an award it gave to a woman, Ms. Hozan, who had run a school in Mozambique for more than twenty years. A Japanese ambassador visited the school and acknowledged it as an exemplary voluntary activity by Japanese citizens in Africa. 

The reason that should support the award’s cancellation is that Ms. Hozan is a board member of the Women’s Federation for World Peace International (WFWP), an organization founded by the leader of the Unification Church/Family Federation, Dr. Hak Ja Han Moon, which is in general consultative status with ECOSOC at the United Nations and has been widely praised for its efforts on behalf of women in developing countries.

More generally, WFWP has been both slandered and administratively harassed. For example, I have seen evidence that on October 28 the registration of the Hokkaido chapter of the WFWP was cancelled by the Sapporo City Council of Social Welfare, after thirty years of cooperation. The WFWP is not involved in the religious activities of the FFWPU nor in collecting donations on its behalf. Clearly, a United-Nations-recognized organization is being discriminated against only because of the religious affiliation of its founders and some of its members.

There is more. A climate of intolerance and discrimination, fueled by hate speech, has not failed to generate hate crimes.

Bitter Winter has seen evidence of domestic violence against women who are members of the FFWPU by husbands who do not belong to the church and are excited by slander campaigns against it, of young believers bullied in school, and adult members harassed in the workplace. There have been threats against churches and ministers, and death threats, often accompanied by racist insults against a “Korean” group, on social media.

Members of the Unification Church in Japan live in fear. Abe’s assassin, Tetsuya Yamagami, started himself vituperating against the church on social media, then resorted to actual violence and murder. There is no safety from hate crimes as long as hate speech continues.

The level of hate disseminated through most (although, happily, not all) Japanese media, the power of the anti-Unification-Church lobby, the fact that the government appears so scared and incapable of resisting it, are all evidence of a witch hunt that has reached alarming proportions. Only an internationalization of the crisis can solve it and prevent serious violations of freedom of religion or belief in Japan.

Tagged With: Japan, Unification Church

Related articles

  • Die Anti-Vereinigungskirchen-Kampagne in Japan: Der Schatten der Kommunistischen Partei

    Die Anti-Vereinigungskirchen-Kampagne in Japan: Der Schatten der Kommunistischen Partei

  • Japan’s Religious Donations Law. 1. An Ambiguous Text

    Japan’s Religious Donations Law. 1. An Ambiguous Text

  • La Campaña Anti-Iglesia de la Unificación en Japón: La Sombra del Partido Comunista

    La Campaña Anti-Iglesia de la Unificación en Japón: La Sombra del Partido Comunista

  • Japans Religionsspenden-Gesetz. 1. Ein mehrdeutiger Text

    Japans Religionsspenden-Gesetz. 1. Ein mehrdeutiger Text

Keep Reading

  • Partidos comunistas y religión: la “guerra final” del Partido Comunista Japonés contra la Iglesia de la Unificación
    Partidos comunistas y religión: la “guerra final” del Partido Comunista Japonés contra la Iglesia de la Unificación

    Los partidos comunistas en los países democráticos tienen una forma tortuosa de atacar a las religiones. Lo que está sucediendo en Japón es solo el capítulo más reciente de una larga historia.

  • Japanisches Religionsspenden-Gesetz. 4. Die Rückkehr der Gehirnwäsche
    Japanisches Religionsspenden-Gesetz. 4. Die Rückkehr der Gehirnwäsche

    Bereits im 20. Jahrhundert wurde die Bezeichnung „Gehirnwäsche“ von Wissenschaftlern aus dem Bereich Neue Religiöse Bewegungen als Pseudowissenschaft entlarvt. Jetzt kehrt sie in Japan zurück.

  • 日本における統一教会危機:信教の自由に対する三つの敵
    日本における統一教会危機:信教の自由に対する三つの敵

    日本は数世紀にわたって信教の自由を攻撃してきた勢力と、それを擁護する勢力とが争う主戦場になりつつある。

  • La crisis de la Iglesia de Unificación en Japón. Los tres enemigos de la libertad religiosa
    La crisis de la Iglesia de Unificación en Japón. Los tres enemigos de la libertad religiosa

    Japón está emergiendo como el principal campo de batalla entre las fuerzas que han atacado la libertad religiosa durante siglos y las que la defienden.

Primary Sidebar

Support Bitter Winter

Learn More

Follow us

Newsletter

Most Read

  • Pro-Chinese Propaganda by The World Muslim Communities Council: Uyghurs Strike Back by Gulfiye Y
  • Zhanargul Zhumatai: “Help Me, I Just Want to Leave China” by Ruth Ingram
  • L. Ron Hubbard, Scientology, and the Visual Arts. 1. The Aesthetic Mind by Massimo Introvigne
  • Stricter Rules on Private Tutoring Protect Ideology Rather than Parents by Wang Zhipeng
  • Japan Religious Donations Law. 4. The Return of Brainwashing by Massimo Introvigne
  • Hong Kong: Christian Scholar Peng Manyuan Released but Not Rehabilitated by Gladys Kwok
  • The Weaponization of the CCP’s “Zero COVID” Against Tibet by Marco Respinti
  • L. Ron Hubbard, Scientology, and the Visual Arts. 3. Art as Communication by Massimo Introvigne
  • L. Ron Hubbard, Scientology, and the Visual Arts. 4. Art and Illustration by Massimo Introvigne
  • L. Ron Hubbard, Scientology, and the Visual Arts. 5. Professionals vs. Amateurs by Massimo Introvigne

CHINA PERSECUTION MAP -SEARCH NEWS BY REGION

clickable geographical map of china, with regions

Footer

Instant Exclusive News
Instant Exclusive News

EDITORIAL BOARD

Editor-in-Chief

MASSIMO INTROVIGNE

Director-in-Charge

MARCO RESPINTI

ADDRESS

CESNUR

Via Confienza 19,

10121 Turin, Italy,

Phone: 39-011-541950

E-MAIL

We welcome submission of unpublished contributions, news, and photographs. Each submission implies the authorization for us to edit and publish texts and photographs. We reserve the right to decide which submissions are suitable for publication. Please, write to INFO@BITTERWINTER.ORG Thank you.

Newsletter

Follow us

LINKS

orlir-logo hrwf-logo cesnur-logo

Copyright © 2023 · Bitter Winter · PRIVACY POLICY· COOKIE POLICY