MURDER OF A JAPANESE MINISTER.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 5400, 18 July 1878, Page 3

MURDER OF A JAPANESE MINISTER.

The Japan Gazette of May 18 contains the following account of the assassination of a leading Japanese Minister and politician “ A cloud of gloom has been cast over society in the capital, and will for a time overshadow the entire country, in the death, at the hands of assassins, of his Excellency Okubo Toshimiohi, Sangi and Naimuhio or Homo Minister, perhaps the ablest man left in the Councils of the Mikado since the death of Kiclo. On the morning of the 11th instant, at about halfpast , eight, the deceased statesman left his house in a carriage, for the purpose of driving to the Asakasa Palace, ‘ there to attend a Cabinet meeting held to consider: the granting of decorations to civil and military officers. The distance to be traversed was ‘a very short one, about a third of a mile, but on it Okubo met his death.’ He was . waylaid by a gang of six or seven ruffians armed with swords,; who, having hamstrung-one of the_ horses, brought the vehicle to a sudden stop, killed the coachman as he fell from the box, and then barbarously murdered the Minister. Strange to say the spot selected for the assassination was that-where an unsuccessful, attempt/was mode ’ upon - the life of Iwakura in 1873. The temaing ■ffere, Unped with peat pomp in

' the new Shinto, cemetery on Awo/ama, d® -the Asakasa Palace,/Tokio, on .the 17th inst. The funeral was attended by all the colleagues of the deceased, the diplomatic body, and numbers of influential native and foreign gentlemen. The assassins have all been arrested or given themselves up. They are not, as was at first supposed and stated, Satsuma men, but samurai of the provinces of Kaga and Tamha. The Government hastened to notify the foreign Consuls that the assassination arose from private enmity, and had no political significance. At the same time they seem to be alarmed themselves, if it is true that the houses of the Ministers are guarded- by police. For publishing what is stated to be a letter received from-the murderers, the Qhoya Shmhun was summarily compelled to cease publication, and the conductors of the native press have been generally warned.to be careful.