#terror wave

By Ben Makuch, 30 March 2025

The far-right militia group Patriot Front at the March for Life in Washington DC on 24 January 2025. Photograph: Dominic Gwinn/Middle East Images/AFP/Getty Images

Donald Trump's administration has ended funding for a slew of counter-terrorism research projects, in a move experts say will hinder future law enforcement abilities to predict and prevent attacks on the public, especially for the far right.

The cuts, affecting multiple agencies and departments, come after the US president granted "unconditional" pardons to about 1,500 people involved in the January 6 attacks on Capitol Hill and the appointment of the Trump ultra-loyalist Kash Patel to the helm of the FBI.

The National Institute of Justice has now scuppered its research into improving the "understanding of radicalization to violent extremism" in local communities. The Department of Defense has also followed up the recent deletion of its social sciences-focused Minerva program by culling $30m in annual funding for academic studies focusing on extremism, disinformation and other subjects.

By Mark Saunokonoko, 7:49am Feb 28 2024

A Japanese man's deathbed confession - that he was one of the country's most wanted fugitives and had been on the run for nearly 50 years - has turned out to be true.

The 70-year-old, who was dying of stomach cancer, told the police he wanted to die using his real name, Satoshi Kirishima, instead of his alias, Hiroshi Uchida.

Four days before he died, Kirishima revealed to police he was part of a radical group that carried out bombings in the 1970s.

A wanted poster for Satoshi Kirishima, a fugitive long wanted for one of a series of terrorist bombings in Japan. (AP/ Eugene Hoshiko)

DNA test results processed after his death confirmed he was telling the truth.

Born in 1954, Kirishima was a university student in Tokyo when he became involved in extremism and joined the East Asia Anti-Japan Armed Front, a militant group that carried out a series of bombings targeting major Japanese companies in the 1970s.

Eight people died more than 160 were injured in the 1975 bombing of a Mitsubishi Heavy Industries building which was blamed on the group.

Kirishima was allegedly involved in a number of the bombings.

He was wanted on charges of setting off a time bomb in a building in Tokyo's posh Ginza district in April 1975 in which no one was injured.

Though not a key member of the group, he was said to be the only one of the 10 members who was never caught.

While on the run, Kirishima did not have a mobile phone or health insurance and had his salary paid in cash to avoid detection, according to NHK public television.

A photo on Kirishima's wanted poster shows him smiling, with long hair and glasses.

Two members of the group were sentenced to death, including founder Masashi Daidoji, who died on death row in 2017.

Satoshi Kirishima had been a member of the extreme left-wing group East Asia Anti-Japan Armed Front. (AP / Eugene Hoshiko)

Two of the eight members of the group were indicted in the bombings are still at large after their release in 1977 as part of a deal negotiated by another radical group, the Japanese Red Army, when it hijacked a Japan Airlines plane in Bangaladesh.

Police are continuing to investigate how he managed to evade capture for 49 years, and whether anyone helped him build a new, second life.

The Japan Times reported Kirishima had been living in Fujisawa in the Kanagawa Prefecture, in Tokyo's west.

He had been employed at a building firm for around 40 years.