Japanese novelist, whose book Underground charted the impact of the 1995 sarin gas attack, says he is unable to argue with judicial killing in this case

The Japanese novelist Haruki Murakami has said that he cannot publicly oppose Japan’s execution of the doomsday cult members behind the 1995 Tokyo sarin gas attack, despite being against the death penalty.



In a rare essay, published in the Mainichi Shimbun on Sunday, Murakami said that “as a general argument, I adopt a stance of opposition toward the death penalty”, pointing to the number of wrongful convictions which mean that “the death penalty, literally, can be described as an institution with fatal dangers”.

But the author, who interviewed survivors and cult members about the sarin attack for his 1997 non-fiction book Underground, said that after speaking to those who were injured and those who lost loved ones, “I cannot publicly state, as far as this case is concerned, ‘I am opposed to death penalty.’”

The Aum Shinrikyo cult’s attack on the Tokyo subway killed 13 people and left more than 6,000 ill. The group’s former leader, Shoko Asahara, was hanged on 6 July along with six other members, with a further six members executed last week.

Murakami said that it was not possible to say that the executions were “right”, but he believes they will not provide closure to those affected by Aum Shinrikyo’s attack. “If there was any intention of ‘bringing a closure to those cases’, or an ulterior motive of making the institution called the death penalty a more permanent one by using this opportunity, that is wrong, and the existence of such a strategy must never be allowed,” he wrote.

Haruki Murakami's new novel declared 'indecent' by Hong Kong censors Read more

The novelist said that writing Underground changed “something inside me”, and spending time listening to the sentencing of the cult members made him feel “like a blunt weight was inside my chest”.

Following the news that all of the 13 death row inmates have been executed, “I similarly feel the existence of that weight in my chest”, wrote Murakami. “A heavy silence that defies words exists inside me. The death that appeared in the courtroom took away its share.”