Japan cult leader who carried out Tokyo sarin attack is executed

Shoko Asahara's followers released the nerve agent in carriages killing 13 people in 1995.

04:32, UK, Friday 06 July 2018
 

Image: Shoko Asahara was hanged on Friday, officials confirmed.

 

The Japanese doomsday cult leader who carried out a deadly nerve agent attack on Tokyo's underground in 1995 has been executed.

Shoko Asahara, 63, was hanged on Friday, two decades after 13 people were killed and more than 6,000 injured in Japan's deadliest terrorist incident.

A Japanese government spokesman confirmed Asahara's death and said six other members of Aum Shinrikyo had also been executed.
The hangings are the largest simultaneous execution in Japan since 1911, when 11 people were hanged for plotting to assassinate the emperor.
In total, 12 followers had been on death row with Asahara after members of the cult punctured plastic bags to release sarin nerve gas inside train carriages in five co-ordinated attacks.
They targeted underground lines, including those passing through Kasumigaseki and Nagatacho, home to the Japanese government.

Image: A commuter is treated outside a station in Tokyo after a sarin gas attack in 1995

Atsushi Sakahara, who was injured in the attack, welcomed the executions.
"When I heard the news, I reacted calmly... but I did feel the world had become slightly brighter," he said.
"I've been in pain for years. It will be impossible to ever forget the incident, but the execution brings a kind of closure."
Founded in 1984, the cult attracted many young people, even graduates of top universities, whom Asahara hand-picked as close aides.
It amassed an arsenal of chemical, biological and conventional weapons to carry out Asahara's escalating criminal orders in anticipation of an apocalyptic showdown with the government.