From: clari.world.asia.japan



TOKYO, July 11 (AFP) - Japan's minister in charge of policy toward
juveniles said Friday that the parents of a 12-year-old who admitted killing a
four-year-old boy should be beheaded, according to media reports.
   Minister Yoshitada Konoike said at a press conference that the parents of
the boy, who earlier this week admitted to killing the pre-schooler, should be
dragged around town and beheaded, Jiji Press and Kyodo News agencies reported.
   "We should decapitate the parents for punishment after dragging them around
the town," Konoike was quoted as saying.
   "There are many fathers and mothers who were educated in post-war school,
which has failed to instill the idea that the just are rewarded and the unjust
punished," he said.
   "Parents of children involved in crimes should be exposed to the public so
that they can realise that it is very serious if their children have done such
a terrible thing."
   Konoike, vice chairman of a committee on promoting positive upbringing for
youths, is in charge of drafting a report due this summer on how the
government can help teachers, parents and police officers raise the nation's
young.
   He is also minister in charge of special deregulation zones and disaster
prevention.
   Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said it was "inappropriate" for
one of his ministers to have made such remarks.
   "I have not heard directly, but the remarks were inappropriate," Koizumi
told an upper house budget committee.
   Konoike refused to retract or apologize for his comments but said he was
speaking metaphorically as a fan of samurai dramas, which frequently include
scenes of lethal retribution meted out by an avenging swordsman.
   The naked body of four-year-old Shun Tanemoto, who went missing after a
shopping trip with his family, was found at the bottom of a multi-storey
carpark a week ago in Nagasaki City, some 950 kilometres (590 miles) southwest
of Tokyo.
   According to police, the 12-year-old suspect, whose name has been withheld,
has admitted to the brutal murder, in which he is believed to have pushed the
younger boy off the roof of the carpark.
   Konoike's remarks were the latest in a series of controversial statements
by prominent Japanese politicians in recent weeks.
   Last week Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda insisted he did not condone
rape after being reported as telling a group of reporters: "There are women
who look like they are saying, 'do it to me'."
   In late June another senior ruling party lawmaker Seiichi Ota sparked
outrage by observing that "those who gang rape (a woman) are fine as they are
in good spirits," when he commented on the arrest of five university students
for allegedly gang raping a woman.
   Former Japanese prime minister Yoshiro Mori also drew fire last week by
suggesting childless women should be denied welfare payments in old age.