Tetsuya Yamagami, the perpetrator of the assassination of former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Photo: Reuters
Tetsuya Yamagami aimed his homemade weapon at Shinzo Abe’s back and fired two shots, destroying the former Japanese prime minister’s neck and heart, leaving him on the ground in a pool of blood. How come? The killer himself explained that it was revenge for Abe’s support of the call Unification Church, better known as the “Moon Sect”, to which her mother donated money.
In a press conference on Monday, the Unification Church confirmed that Yamagami’s mother attended the congregation monthly, but refused to refer to the alleged donations.
What is the lunar sect? The religious group was founded in Korea in the middle of the last century from Sun Myungmoon, died in 2012. At the time the sect claimed three million followers, who proclaimed him the True Father.
Tetsuya Yamagami. Photo: Reuters
For decades the sect was famous for its organization mass marriageswith thousands of couples meeting in gigantic sports stadiums.
Sun Myung Moon was born into a peasant family in what is now North Korea. She claimed to have had it at the age of 15 a vision of Jesus Christ asking him to continue his mission for humanity to reach a state of “sinless” purity.
After founding his church in 1954 in Seoul, Moon soon turned to politics, initially adopting a clearly anti-communist lineand attracting the sympathy of the South Korean military regime of the time.
Reverend Moon during a massive wedding ceremony at a Seoul stadium in 2002. Photo: AFP
even the moon dealt with foreign heads of state, like Richard Nixon in the United States, who he argued during the Watergate scandal. In France in the 1980s, his Church had brief ties to the far-right movement National Front.
The organization gradually became an economic empire present in various sectors (construction, food, automotive, tourism, media …), which made it the founder a billionaire
Sun Myung Moon embarked on his first world tour in 1965 and settled in the United States in the 1970s. convicted of tax evasion, he spent more than a year in prison in the United States in the early 1980s.
Julio Maria Sanguinetti and Reverend Moon in Uruguay, in 1995. Photo: archive
Today the Reunification Church is controlled by the widow of its founder, Hak Ja Han, his second wife, with whom he had a dozen children.
a video message
The sect of the moon has links with world leaders conservative ideology e Abe would have sent a video message to support some of his meetings.
“Abe has shown his support for our global peace movement. However, never registered as a member of our church, nor as a counselor, “Tomihiro Tanaka, president of the Japanese branch of the Moon Church, said at a press conference.
“We are a bit perplexed because there is a long way to go between holding a grudge against us and killing Mr. Abe. We fail to understand the suspect’s motives, so we will cooperate fully with the police to disclose it.”
Japanese authorities announced shortly after Yamagami’s arrest that the suspect had doubts about a religious group linked to Abe. but kept the name apparently for it will not affect the upper house elections this weekend.
Japan is a Buddhist countryShinto, but hosts thousands of sevens and new religions including imported beliefs.
With the Tokyo correspondent of RFI, Gonzalo Robledo and AFP
ap
Source: Clarin
