Update July 15 2008: After 23 days on remand Junichi and Toru have finally been released on bail today. We'd like to say a huge thank you to the many international Non-Governmental Organisations who signed a Statement of Concern about the situation, and above all to the quarter of a million people who sent an email to the Japanese government demanding their release.
Our Japanese activists Junichi Sato and Toru Suzuki were charged with
theft and trespass today by the prosecutor in Aomori after they exposed
a major scandal around the embezzlement of whale meat from the Japanese
government-sponsored Southern Ocean whaling programme.
Junichi and Toru continue to be held in detention in Aomori, where they have been since their arrest on June 20th, despite widespread international protest.