JAPANESE MINISTER WANTS 'AUTOMATIC' EXECUTIONS

Japan's justice minister called for quicker executions, saying death row inmates should be hanged "automatically" within six months of losing their last appeal. Japan is the only major industrial nation other than the United States that practises the death penalty, despite having one of the world's lowest crime rates. Kunio Hatoyama, who was reappointed to his job in the new cabinet, said Japan needed capital punishment because "we have been seeing extremely violent, vicious crimes in recent years." He said he wanted Japan to implement a little-enforced law that requires the execution of inmates within six months of their final sentences. Currently, the justice minister signs off on every execution. "I think we might want to consider a system in which it takes place automatically and objectively without the justice minister's involvement," Hatoyama said, saying signing off placed an emotional burden on the minister. dicpolg