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TOKYO-Japan hanged three convicted murderers on Tuesday, including a serial killer of four young girls, the Justice Ministry said, in a further sign the country is speeding up the pace of executions.Among those executed was 45-year-old Tsutomu Miyazaki, who kidnapped, murdered four young girls aged 4-7 years in the late 1980s, then cut up and burned their bodies, the ministry said in a statement.The hangings bring to 13 the number of executions authorized by Justice Minister Kunio Hatoyama, a strong supporter of the death penalty, since he took office last September.Also executed were 73-year-old Yoshio Yamasaki, who murdered two people for insurance money, and 37-year-old Shinji Mutsuda, who killed two people and threw their bodies into the ocean in a box packed with concrete."The lives of the victims were taken in these extremely brutal cases that go beyond words," Justice Minister Kunio Hatoyama said."To realize justice and to securely protect a nation where the law is respected, I am enforcing the death penalties."Hatoyama is trying to reduce the number of prisoners on death row, after a previous justice minister refused to sign death warrants for religious reasons.Opinion polls show most Japanese people support capital punishment but there is a vocal movement to try to end the hangings."It seems like he has completely deviated from the rule of executing extremely cautiously," said Akiko Takada, a member of Forum 90, an anti-death penalty organization with some 5,000 participants including around 200 lawmakers.To read more go to:
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