When three Japanese civilians taken hostage in Iraq returned home earlier this week, there were no well-wishers awaiting them. As they left the plane, the two volunteer aid workers and a freelance photojournalist hung their heads and kept silent.
Despite their safe release, it was a bleak homecoming. But it didn't end there.
The three -- Noriaki Imai, 18, Nahoko Takato, 34, and photojournalist Soichiro Koriyama, 32 -- have been accused of rashly ignoring government warnings to stay away from Iraq. They were blamed for imperiling the Japanese military's humanitarian mission to Iraq. Afterward, the government said it would bill them US$6,000 for their flights and other expenses.
Since their arrival last Sunday, the three have been caught in a maelstrom of public criticism that has made them virtual prisoners in their own homes and raised questions about just how far the government should go to warn its citizens about traveling to combat zones. On Friday, the head of a Japanese aid group said the backlash was overblown.
"The government has a duty to act if something happens to any of its citizens," said Michiya Kumaoka, president of the Japan International Volunteer Center, which supplied medicine to two children's hospitals in Baghdad until withdrawing its staff this month.
The national Asahi newspaper agreed.
"We cannot deny that the former hostages should have been better prepared," the liberal daily said in an editorial Thursday. "However, there is no way we could ever agree with any of the strident talk ... from members of the ruling coalition who are obviously taking an extreme position on what they think `personal responsibility' is supposed to mean."
Still, for Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, the hostage crisis could have been a political disaster.
The Japanese leader has pushed aggressively for the deployment of about 1,100 non-combat troops to support the US-led coalition in Iraq. About 550 Japanese ground forces are in southern Iraq purifying water and helping rebuild roads and schools.
Public opinion had been divided over the deployment -- the first to a combat zone since World War II -- and critics had warned the dispatch would make Japan a target for terrorists.
The hostage-taking appeared to justify the critics' view.
Imai, Takato and Koriyama were kidnapped by a previously unknown group that released a video showing the three blindfolded, forced to squat and being threatened with guns.
The gunmen threatened to burn them to death in three days unless Tokyo pulled its ground troops out of Iraq -- a demand that Koizumi rejected.
The abductions set off protests calling for a pullout, and drew tearful pleas from the hostages' families for Tokyo to withdraw. Six days later, two more Japanese were kidnapped.
By this week, all five hostages had been released unharmed with the help of Islamic religious leaders.
Reaction from Japan's closest ally, the US, was one of admiration for the former hostages.
"Everybody should understand the risk they are taking by going into dangerous areas," US Secretary of State Colin Powell told reporters. "But if nobody was willing to take a risk, then we would never move forward."
"And so I'm pleased that these Japanese citizens were willing to put themselves at risk for a greater good, for a better purpose. And the Japanese people should be very proud that they have citizens like this willing to do that," Powell said, in remarks aired by TV networks in Japan.
But many Japanese questioned the ex-hostages' judgment.
"Even though their intentions were good, they should reflect on why they ignored the government's warnings against going to a place as dangerous as Iraq," the conservative Nihon Keizai, Japan's leading financial newspaper, said in an editorial after the hostages were freed.
"They could have compromised Japan's humanitarian mission in Iraq, and this country's foreign policy in general," the editorial said.
The families of the hostages said they had received numerous critical phone calls and e-mails, some slamming the families themselves for urging the government to bow to the gunmen's demand to withdraw troops.
They quickly eased off the pressure and later apologized to the public.
Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi said Tuesday she might consider tougher travel warnings, and ministry officials said they were considering posting advisories cautioning that the government might not be able to rescue travelers who put their lives at risk.
A beauty queen who pulled out of the Miss South Africa competition when her nationality was questioned has said she wants to relocate to Nigeria, after coming second in the Miss Universe pageant while representing the West African country. Chidimma Adetshina, whose father is Nigerian, was crowned Miss Universe Africa and Oceania and was runner-up to Denmark’s Victoria Kjar Theilvig in Mexico on Saturday night. The 23-year-old law student withdrew from the Miss South Africa competition in August, saying that she needed to protect herself and her family after the government alleged that her mother had stolen the identity of a South
BELT-TIGHTENING: Chinese investments in Cambodia are projected to drop to US$35 million in 2026 from more than US$420 million in 2021 At a ceremony in August, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet knelt to receive blessings from saffron-robed monks as fireworks and balloons heralded the breaking of ground for a canal he hoped would transform his country’s economic fortunes. Addressing hundreds of people waving the Cambodian flag, Hun Manet said China would contribute 49 percent to the funding of the Funan Techo Canal that would link the Mekong River to the Gulf of Thailand and reduce Cambodia’s shipping reliance on Vietnam. Cambodia’s government estimates the strategic, if contentious, infrastructure project would cost US$1.7 billion, nearly 4 percent of the nation’s annual GDP. However, months later,
HOPEFUL FOR PEACE: Zelenskiy said that the war would ‘end sooner’ with Trump and that Ukraine must do all it can to ensure the fighting ends next year Russia’s state-owned gas company Gazprom early yesterday suspended gas deliveries via Ukraine, Vienna-based utility OMV said, in a development that signals a fast-approaching end of Moscow’s last gas flows to Europe. Russia’s oldest gas-export route to Europe, a pipeline dating back to Soviet days via Ukraine, is set to shut at the end of this year. Ukraine has said it would not extend the transit agreement with Russian state-owned Gazprom to deprive Russia of profits that Kyiv says help to finance the war against it. Moscow’s suspension of gas for Austria, the main receiver of gas via Ukraine, means Russia now only
‘HARD-HEADED’: Some people did not evacuate to protect their property or because they were skeptical of the warnings, a disaster agency official said Typhoon Man-yi yesterday slammed into the Philippines’ most populous island, with the national weather service warning of flooding, landslides and huge waves as the storm sweeps across the archipelago nation. Man-yi was still packing maximum sustained winds of 185kph after making its first landfall late on Saturday on lightly populated Catanduanes island. More than 1.2 million people fled their homes ahead of Man-yi as the weather forecaster warned of a “life-threatening” effect from the powerful storm, which follows an unusual streak of violent weather. Man-yi uprooted trees, brought down power lines and smashed flimsy houses to pieces after hitting Catanduanes in the typhoon-prone
RSS