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A Tokyo court has ordered the Japan arm of the Unification Church to be dissolved after finding it defrauded its followers. The 2022 assassination of Japan's former prime minister focused public attention on longstanding ties between the church and Japan's ruling party. NPR's Anthony Kuhn has the report, and you should know this story contains sounds of gunshots.
ANTHONY KUHN, BYLINE: The Tokyo High Court upheld a lower court ruling last year against the Unification Church, now officially known as the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification. The church was founded in South Korea by the Reverend Sun Myung Moon in 1954. The ruling strips the Japan arm of the church of its status as a tax-exempt religious corporation. The key issue in the case was the church's so-called spiritual sales in which followers were coerced to make large donations to the church to forgive their sins. The court ruled that since the 1980s, the church bilked some 1,500 people out of about $130 million. Scholar of religion Hiromi Shimada says the problem should have been addressed when it was most serious some 40 years ago.
HIROMI SHIMADA: (Through interpreter) It should have been done in the past, but was put off, leading to the current situation. And in the process, Abe was killed.
(SOUNDBITE OF GUNSHOTS)
KUHN: Ex-Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was gunned down in 2022 by Tetsuya Yamagami, who said that his family was bankrupted by his mother's donations to the church and that he targeted Abe because of his links to the organization. A court sentenced Yamagami to life in prison in January. After the killing, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party admitted that about half of its lawmakers had ties to the church. It was a political scandal, but Shimada says, very few LDP politicians have been held accountable.
SHIMADA: (Through interpreter) To avoid scrutiny of its relationship with the former Unification Church, the LDP's strategy seems to have been to push all the responsibility onto the church and force it to disband.
KUHN: In a statement, the church said, the unjust court ruling will undermine Japan's international credibility and says it plans to appeal. The court, meanwhile, will appoint an attorney to liquidate the church's assets and compensate victims. Anthony Kuhn, NPR News, Seoul.
(SOUNDBITE OF MORUF AND SZA SONG, "PT CRUISER") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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