Editorial

15:36 JST, March 21, 2025

It has been 30 years since the sarin gas attack by the Aum Supreme Truth cult on the Tokyo subway system. Lessons learned from this incident causing so much harm must be utilized to ensure that another indiscriminate terrorist attack never happens again.

In the attack, Aum targeted the morning commute hour, killing 14 people and injuring more than 6,000 by releasing highly poisonous sarin gas on subway trains. Under the direction of cult founder and former death-row inmate Chizuo Matsumoto, Aum followers and others had been arming themselves before the crime was committed.

For a spate of crimes committed by the cult, including the murder of lawyer Tsutsumi Sakamoto and his family, as well as another sarin attack, which took place in Matsumoto, Nagano Prefecture, 190 people — including the........

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