TOKYO: A Tokyo court ordered the dissolution of a religious group whose fundraising methods and ties with ruling party politicians came under scrutiny following the assassination of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe more than two years ago.
A spokesperson for the Unification Church, now formally known as the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification, confirmed that the court had ordered them to disband Tuesday (March 25).
The Tokyo district court’s decision strips the group of its tax-free status as a religious corporation, but doesn’t prevent it from operating in Japan, which has been a major base of its support for decades.
The church has the right to appeal the ruling.
"We have to say that this ruling was based on an incorrect interpretation of the law and is totally unacceptable to this organisation,” a statement on the church’s website said.
Known for its mass weddings and members informally called "Moonies,” the group came under the spotlight after Abe’s killer told police he was motivated by the former premier’s links to the church, which he blamed for bankrupting his family by taking excessive donations from his mother.
The incident prompted the ruling Liberal Democratic Party to launch an internal investigation that found almost half of its lawmakers had connections with the church.
The party has since struggled to restore its image and it lost its majority in an election last October.
The Ministry of Education and Culture filed a request seeking the disbanding of the church in October 2023, claiming that the organisation had limited the free will of its followers to coerce them into donating money.
The group has a list of court rulings against it for its fundraising methods.
"Our claims were accepted,” Japan’s Minister of Education Toshiko Abe said in a statement.
Tuesday’s dissolution order was the third in Japan since World War II. Aum Shinrikyo, the death cult that carried out a lethal poison gas attack on the Tokyo subway thirty years ago, was stripped of its status as a religious legal entity in 1995.
The former Unification Church, based in South Korea, has fought back, saying it has made structural changes and the legal conditions necessary for a religious organization to be dissolved do not apply. - Bloomberg
--With assistance from Takashi Hirokawa and Yuko Takeo.
(Updates with comments from the church and the minister of education)
