Tokyo

History unheeded? Despite 1995's sarin gas attack, Japan is ill-prepared to fight terrorism. Credit: AP

Japan remains vulnerable to bioterrorist and chemical attacks, citizen groups and biomedical researchers are warning. Despite suffering the 1995 sarin nerve-gas attack on the Tokyo subway, the government has not taken sufficient action, the groups say.

“Now many hospitals and clinics are aware of emergency measures for sarin treatment,” says Masanori Fukushima, an epidemiologist at Kyoto University, “but there is no preparation for recognizing victims of bioterrorism.”

Yukitatsu Kawamoto, of the Citizen's Centre for the Prevention of Biohazards in Chiba, notes that in 1993 Aum Shinrikyo, the cult behind the sarin attack, sprayed a non-virulent strain of anthrax from the roof of its Tokyo headquarters. “The authorities never tracked down where Aum got it, and they haven't taken measures to account for such materials since then,” he says.

And last week Yasuo Fukuda, the government's chief cabinet secretary, admitted that Japan's anti-terrorism preparations are inadequate.

But Toshinobu Sato, director of the Office of Health Crisis Management, claims that security at health-ministry institutes is sufficient to prevent anyone from removing potential biological weapons.