Japan | Survivors, relatives mark 31 years since sarin gas attack on Tokyo subway

Deadly nerve gas attack on the Tokyo subway system by the Aum Shinrikyo cult in 1995

TOKYO—People whose lives were upended by the 1995 deadly nerve gas attack on the Tokyo subway system by the Aum Shinrikyo cult marked the 31st anniversary on Friday, with their pain still unhealed despite growing worries about public memory of the event fading.

Shizue Takahashi, who lost her husband, then a deputy stationmaster at Kasumigaseki Station, was among those who offered flowers and prayers. Station staff observed a moment of silence at around 8 a.m., when the worst terrorist attack on Japan occurred during the morning rush hour.

"People who lost their family members as well as survivors continue to suffer to this date. Even after more than 30 years, the horror (of the attack) lingers," the 79-year-old said.

Sarin nerve agent was released in five subway train cars on March 20, 1995, killing 14 people and injuring over 6,000.

The attack, which came at the instruction of cult founder Shoko Asahara, shocked the nation and put the spotlight on the group, which was later disbanded. Three successor groups still exist.

Shoko Asahara, whose real name was Chizuo Matsumoto, the founder of the Aum Shinrikyo doomsday cult, was executed by hanging on July 6, 2018, along with six other senior former members of the group.

The executions, carried out at detention facilities including the Tokyo Detention House and others across Japan, followed the exhaustion of all appeals related to their convictions for multiple murders, including masterminding the deadly 1995 sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway system that killed 13 people and injured thousands.

Six additional cult members sentenced to death for their roles in the same crimes were executed by hanging on July 26, 2018, completing the hangings of all 13 individuals on death row for the cult's offenses.

In a recent survey by a support group targeting 323 people affected by the attack, 26 percent of survivors and 33 percent of family members said they still suffer from symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder.

Some 75 percent said they did not want to let the deadly attack be forgotten.

Family members of the victims have been calling on the government to continue monitoring the activities of the successor groups while demanding one of the groups, Aleph, follow a court order to pay around 1 billion yen in compensation.

Source: Japan Today, Staff; DPN, March 20, 2026

"One is absolutely sickened, not by the crimes that the wicked have committed,
but by the punishments that the good have inflicted."

— Oscar Wilde

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