Kishida Eyeing Bill for Unification Church Victims This Diet Session

Tokyo, Oct. 18 (Jiji Press)--Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on Tuesday indicated that the government is preparing to submit during the ongoing parliamentary session a bill on relief measures for victims of so-called spiritual sales and other practices by the controversial religious group formerly known as the Unification Church.

"We plan to submit government bills to amend laws from ones that are ready," Kishida said at a meeting of the Budget Committee of the House of Representatives, the lower chamber of the Diet, the country's parliament.

"Preparations (to submit the amendments) are underway, with the ongoing (extraordinary) Diet session in mind," he added.

On a court order for dissolving a religious group based on the religious corporation law, Kishida said that such a move can be applied to cases involving violations of the criminal law and other regulations, not to cases related to Civil Code breaches.

Noting that some of the cases handled by the government's consultation office for problems related to the Unification Church were relayed to police, Kishida said, "We have launched procedures as we believe that (the Unification Church) may have violated the criminal law and other regulations."

[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]