A Japanese citizen has apparently been abducted in Iraq and is threatened with beheading. CNN is saying the hostage is a soldier, but the fellow in the picture has shoulder-length hair and no one is reported missing from the SDP base. PM Koizumi has already said troops will not be withdrawn.
Reaction in Japan: too early to tell. A slim, silent majority oppose Japan’s involvement in Iraq, but it isn’t a particularly major issue as in the Republic of Korea. Younghusband and I will keep our eyes on the press and see how the Japanese public sees this. Meanwhile, read here about Japan’s patriotic revival and what a few school teachers are trying to do about it.
UPDATE: The militants are describing the hostage as “an element connected to the Japanese armed forces.”
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COMMENTS / 4 COMMENTS
Saru added these pithy words on 27 Oct 04 at 2:18 pmMaybe the long-hair was the choreographer for “this embarrasment”: http://www.jda.go.jp/JMSDF/event/cm_p/
Saru added these pithy words on 27 Oct 04 at 2:20 pmSorry about the format of that last post.
What the hell is this Textile “Humane Web Text Generator” garbage? Linking using HTML is much less confusing.
Saru added these pithy words on 27 Oct 04 at 2:39 pmMay as well leave one more post before someone else beats me to it.
According to the Mainichi, he’s a 24 year old on working holiday. His parents told the Japanese press that he left for New Zealand this January and contact had been sporadic lately.
The story also quoted his parents as saying that, “from a very young age he always had a soft heart so he probably wanted to see the suffering of the Iraqi people with his own eyes and try to think about their (?) future.”
Then to their son’s captors: ” He didn’t support the SDF deployment to Iraq nor the US occupation. He has a youthful compassion and a sense of justice and was trying to turn his attention towards suffering Iraqis. We are asking you, from the bottom of our hearts, to please release [our son].”
http://headlines.yahoo.co.jp/hl?a=20041027-00000159-mai-soci
Younghusband added these pithy words on 01 Nov 04 at 4:14 amTextile makes it much faster to format your posts, but you are fully welcome to use HTML if it is easier for you. The system can handle both.
