Islamic State says it has beheaded second Japanese hostage Goto

A woman walks past television screens displaying a news program about Japanese journalist Kenji Goto, who is being held hostage by Islamic State militants, on a street in Tokyo February 1, 2015. REUTERS/Yuya Shino

TOKYO (Reuters) - Islamic State militants said they had beheaded a second Japanese hostage, journalist Kenji Goto, prompting Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to vow to step up humanitarian aid to the group's opponents in the Middle East and help bring his killers to justice.

"I feel intense indignation at this utterly cruel and despicable act of terrorism," a grim-faced Abe told an emergency Cabinet meeting early on Sunday, shortly after a video surfaced purporting to show the beheading of Goto, after the failure of international efforts to secure his release through a prisoner swap.