Japan Airlines Flight 351

Infobox Airliner accident
name=Japan Airlines Flight 351
Date=March 31, 1970
Type=Hijacking
Site=Japan
Origin=Tokyo International Airport(Haneda)
Destination=Fukuoka Airport
Fatalities=0
Injuries=
Aircraft Type=Boeing 727-89
Operator=Japan Airlines
Tail Number=JA8315 "YODOGO"
Passengers=122 (excluding the hijackers)
Crew=7
Survivors=122 (excluding the hijackers)

Japan Airlines Flight 351 was hijacked by nine members of the Japanese Communist League-Red Army Faction (a predecessor of the Japanese Red Army) on March 31, 1970 while flying from Tokyo to Fukuoka, in an incident typically referred to in Japanese as the nihongo|Yodogo Hijacking|よど号ハイジャック事件|Yodogō Haijakku Jiken. The hijackers took 129 hostages (122 passengers and seven crew members), later releasing them at Fukuoka Airport and Seoul's Kimpo Airport. They then proceeded to Pyongyang's Mirim Airport, where they surrendered to North Korean authorities, who offered the whole group asylum. Yoshimi Tanaka was arrested in Thailand and repatriated to Japan in March 2000. However, the other hijackers remain at large; according to Japan's National Police Agency, Takamaro Tamiya and one other hijacker died in North Korea, while Takahiro Konishi, Shiro Akagi, Kimihuro Uomoto, Moriaki Wakabayashi, and Takeshi Okamoto still reside there; all except Okamoto were confirmed to have been alive as of 2004 when they were interviewed by Kyodo News. In June 2004, the remaining hijackers made a request to North Korean authorities that they be allowed to return to Japan.cite paper|url=http://www.npa.go.jp/keibi/kokutero1/english/pdf/sec03.pdf|format=PDF|date=2003|title=Movements of the Japanese Red Army and the "Yodo-go" Group"|publisher=National Police Agency, Japan|accessdate=2007-03-15]

Moriaki Wakabayashi was an early member (bass player) in the long-running avant-garde rock band Les Rallizes Dénudés.

The future Roman Catholic archbishop and cardinal Stephen Fumio Hamao was one of the passengers on this flight.

See also

* Japanese people in North Korea

References