# Japan court upholds order to dissolve Unification Church
Japan’s Tokyo High Court has upheld an order to dissolve the Unification Church, keeping alive one of the country’s most consequential postwar church-state disputes and moving the group closer to losing its tax-exempt status.
The supplied evidence says the court rejected the church’s appeal and backed an earlier Tokyo District Court ruling that ordered disbandment after the education and culture ministry accused the organization of manipulating followers into making huge donations. The decision means the dissolution order would take effect immediately, though the church can still appeal to Japan’s Supreme Court.
The ruling is significant because the Unification Church is the first religious organization in Japan to face a dissolution order for a civil offense. That status alone makes the case a legal landmark. The order does not ban the church from operating, but it would strip tax benefits and require the liquidation of assets under court supervision.
The case cannot be separated from the assassination of former prime minister Shinzo Abe in 2022. The evidence says the church came under scrutiny after that killing, because the shooter said he held a grudge against Abe over the former leader’s ties to the church. That connection triggered wider investigations into the organization’s influence and its relationship with conservative lawmakers.
The ministries and courts were not acting in a vacuum. According to the evidence, investigators found that church practices included coercing followers into buying expensive items by exploiting fears about spiritual well-being. The Tokyo District Court previously concluded that the organization had taken about 20.4 billion yen from more than 1,500 people, a scale of alleged abuse that helps explain why the state moved for dissolution.
For the church, the high court ruling narrows its options but does not end the case. It can still challenge the order at the Supreme Court, meaning the legal fight is not over. Still, the immediate effect of the appeal loss would be to put the liquidation process in motion under judicial supervision.
The ruling also has a broader political and social dimension. The church’s history, its controversial teachings and the investigations that followed Abe’s death have made it a symbol of how religious organizations can become entangled with politics, family harm and public trust. Chief cabinet secretary Minoru Kihara said government agencies had been instructed to work on relief measures for victims.
At this stage, the court ruling is both procedural and symbolic: procedural because it advances a formal dissolution process, symbolic because it confirms that the state’s response to the scandal is still moving forward years after Abe’s assassination. For followers, victims and observers, the church’s next step will determine whether the final word comes from Tokyo or from Japan’s highest court.
