Church officials have accused Japanese lawmakers of acting on “biased information from a left-wing lawyer group” in filing the request in Tokyo District court on Friday — a move coming a year after Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida launched an investigation into the church’s activities.
Decades of relations between the church and Japan’s governing Liberal Democratic Party — the party of both Mr. Abe and Mr. Kishida — have drawn attention over the past year and have eroded support for the Kishida government. While the request spurred global headlines over the weekend, legal analysts note that the court process will involve months — if not years — of hearings.
The church was founded in 1954 by the Rev. Sun Myung Moon, a fierce proponent of religious freedom. What began with a tiny, embattled church he founded in South Korea has evolved through the decades into a global spiritual movement and an affiliated commercial empire comprising hundreds of ventures in more than a half-dozen countries, including The Washington Times.
Japan’s Agency for Cultural Affairs found 32 cases of civil lawsuits acknowledging damages totaling $14.7 million for 169 people, while the amount of settlements reached in or outside court totaled $137 million and involved 1,550 people, the education minister said. “Since the Compliance Declaration in 2009, we have actively worked on church reform, especially by appointing a new generation of leaders who will carry the future, and have continued to promote reform to this day,” the FFWPU said. The statement added that “since September last year, we have established a ‘Church Reform Promotion Headquarters’ …and have been working on further reforms.
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