Japan Press Weekly

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2023 November 8 - 14 [POLITICS]

Shiokawa: LDP should cut its ties with Moonies-affiliated anticommunist federation

Japanese Communist Party representative Shiokawa Tetsuya at a Lower House Cabinet Committee meeting on November 8 demanded that the ruling Liberal Democratic Party break off its ties with the International Federation for Victory over Communism (IFVC) which is affiliated with the former Unification Church, currently renamed the Family Federation for World Peace and Unification.

The head of the ex-Unification Church Japan branch, Tanaka Tomihiro, on the previous day at a press conference said, “Criticism that our organization has anti-Japanese thoughts is not true.” Tanaka then mentioned as evidence that the organization has been combatting communism together with the IFVC.

Shiokawa criticized the LDP for having long used the IFVC for the purpose of gaining political benefits.

He pointed out that the IFVC has not only engaged in conspiracies to attack the JCP and progressive mayors or governors but also targeted legal experts who work for the relief of the cult’s victims.

Shiokawa stated, “The use of the IFVC by the LDP for political purposes is the underlying reason for its having overlooked the Moonies’ antisocial acts, including the fraudulent sales of exorbitantly costly goods by use of spiritual pressure tactics.”

Chief Cabinet Secretary Matsuno Hirokazu in response said that the IFVC is also “an organization that the government should cut off its ties with.”