Skip to main content

Police Search for Suspicious Objects Ahead of Tokyo Marathon

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/news/html/20150219/k10015583221000.html

translated by Brett Larner

As part of the counter-terrorism operations surrounding the Feb. 22 Tokyo Marathon, police officers and local residents patrolled part of the course in Ginza looking for suspicious objects.  Roughly 50 officers from the Tsukiji Police Station and members of the local merchants' association took part in the Ginza patrol, examining the area around the course to make sure there were no suspicious objects.  Afterward they handed out pamphlets to passersby on which was written, "If you see any suspicious people or objects, call the police at #110," asking for citizens' help in ensuring a safe race.

With 36,000 runners Sunday's Tokyo Marathon is the largest marathon in the country.  In response to the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings, beginning last year police and organizers have increased their counter-terrorism efforts.  This year 4500 police officers will be on duty at the race, with surveillance cameras placed around the course and armed riot police who will run among the Tokyo Marathon runners to patrol them.  Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department security director Hideki Shinohara commented, "The security of the Tokyo Marathon is a crucial step in the preparations for the 2020 Tokyo Olymipcs and Paralympics, and we want our security efforts at each of these events to be successful."

Comments

Most-Read This Week

On the Loss of the ARRS Database

At some point in the last few months I discovered that both versions of the ARRS database, the static one and the searchable version , are gone. Last week David Monti posted a link to the ARRS history of an event he covered in Race Results Weekly, I guess copying and pasting a link from last year without looking at it, and that reminded me to write something about the loss of the database. The Association of Road Racing Statisticians was basically a one-man show operated from the remote Northern California shores by Ken Young . When the site existed its intro read: The Association of Road Racing Statisticians (ARRS) is an independent, non-profit organization that collects, analyses and publishes results and statistics regarding elite distance running at distances 3000m and longer...The data of ARRS is stored in the ARRS database, which has more than 1.3 million performances from more than 240,000 races by more than 95,000 elite and sub-elite distance runners worldwide...This website ...

Multiple National Records This Weekend

Olympic and World champion Haruka Kitaguchi got the biggest headlines among Japanese athletes this weekend, overcoming a rough last year and a half that included injury and a coaching change to break her own javelin throw NR by over a meter and a half to win the inaugural WA Ultimate Championship in Budapest. U20 WR and Asian AR holder Ziyi Yan opened with a big 68.05, 0.67 m further than Kitaguchi's best-ever from back in 2023. That could have been the end, but Kitaguchi came back from a 61.15 m first attempt to throw a massive 68.92 m NR on her next one, ultimately enough for the win. She still has a long way to go to match the 18-year-old Yan's 71.74 m from May, but it was a clear statement that Kitaguchi is back. Back home at the National Corporate Track and Field Championships in Kyoto, women's pole vault NR holder Misaki Morota continued a solid comeback season of her own, bettering her NR from May by 1 cm with a 4.51 m on her first attempt. Morota took another 3...