Children's Express reporter Marty Kelly, from West Belfast, reports from Tokyo on how Japan has been affected by terrorism.
| According to the young people, the Japanese government hide facts and information regarding terrorism to avoid panic. |
Japan has been named on Al Qaeda's 'hit list' of targets that it might bomb, so I was amazed to discover how differently the Japanese are dealing with the threat of a terrorist attack.
Jiro Hirano a freelance journalist who works for NHK, the Japanese equivalent to the BBC, states that "Japanese people think that safety and freedom is a given right.
"It's in their way of thinking and it's been so for a long time because Japan has been a secluded country."
He continued: "You can definitely recognize the face of the Japanese in Japan by the look of the face, by the eyes, by the way they speak.
"So you can tell who is on my side, and who is not on my side, and this makes the Japanese people feel very safe".
The Japanese people may feel safe in Japan but things have changed. After the Madrid bomb in March 11th the bins from all the train and underground stations have been sealed and in some cases removed as an anti-bomb measure.
Also in the train stations and on the trains there are now regular announcements about unattended luggage which may be dangerous, to stay away from it and to make others aware.
I discovered that the Japanese did not see the sarin nerve gas attacks in the underground of 1995 by the Aum cultists as an act of terrorism unlike other countries of the world. This has probably more to do with the way the Japanese media reported the crime within their own country.
According to the young people I met the Japanese government hide facts and information regarding terrorism to avoid panic. Also they don't display pictures of suspects in the news or in public places.
Ayami Akitou, 16 said: "I feel that it is good to warn people but not too much as we have a lot of news regarding terrorism at the moment. The government doesn't want to panic people and I can see what they are trying to do."
In the full week I spent within Japan I did a lot of traveling and I've only seen two police cars and only three police officers. In one day in Belfast I would have seen a lot more policemen and policewomen.
Japan claims to have no army but instead to have an organization of trained soldiers named the ground self defense force (GSDF), 1,000 members of which have been sent to Iraq. Taking all this into account, the last terrorist attack on Japan was nearly ten years ago. It seems that all the security measures are an overreaction to the apparent threat of global terrorism.
Sitting in a hotel room in Japan, feels like I'm sitting half a world away from my home in west Belfast. I know that because I have lived with what some may describe as terrorism for the main core of my life it's hard for me to understand the reactions of the Japanese people to what is really an invisible threat.
What do I learn from this? What will I take back home from my experience?
I think that I have become numb to the effects of what some may see as terrorism and this makes me feel as if the Japanese are over reacting, but then possibly it is me who is under reacting to the whole situation.
About the team
This story was produced by Martin Kelly, 16 and Orlaith Wood,16. It was published by Andersonstown News.
