7 Dead in Tokyo Stabbing Rampage

Reviewed by Takahiro MIYAO

Article:
7 Dead in Tokyo Stabbing Rampage
USAToday (6/8/2008)
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/
2008-06-08-stabbing-tokyo_N.htm

Reference:
Tokyo, Madrid Score Higher Than Chicago in Olympic Bid Report
Bloomberg News (6/8)
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/
news?pid=20601080&sid=a.VVuel7pKCU&refer=asia

Comments:

This morning the world woke up and found out what happened in one of the best known districts of Tokyo, this time not for a cool electronic gadget, but for a brutal stabbing spree, leaving several people dead and many more seriously injured (see the link above). It should be pointed out that just like a stabbing incident which happened in a Joban-line train station outside of Tokyo about three months ago, some policemen who were supposed to protect citizens were assaulted and injured before arresting the killer.

This raises a serious question about public safety and security on the streets in Tokyo, especially in connection with international events such as the Olympics. Although Tokyo appears to be safe, compared to other major cities in the world, as it has been selected as one of the four finalists to host the 2016 Olympics by the IOC last week (see the link above), this kind of random violence could happen anytime and anywhere in Tokyo these days, and clearly the current police force is not enough to protect citizens from vicious assaults and attacks with no clear, thus no predictable, motives. In fact, this security concern is known to be one of the major reasons why the G-8 Summit this summer has been decided to be held not in a major city like Tokyo, but rather in an extremely remote and completely isolated area of the northern most island, Hokkaido.

Some might argue that current strict restrictions on the use of guns by policemen should be relaxed, especially in case of emergency like recent stabbing incidents in the Tokyo area. Whether it is reasonable or not, something drastic like that might be necessary to turn around the trend of deteriorating security conditions in Tokyo and other cities for Japan to host any major domestic or international event from now on.

Acknowledgment:
This review is adopted from the following blog (with its Japanese translation):
http://glocom.blog59.fc2.com/blog-date-20080609.html