Japanese police are deploying about 20,000 officers around the venue of the Group of Eight summit in Hokkaido and also as many officers in Tokyo to brace for possible violent rallies or other emergency incidents, police officials said Wednesday. With the clock ticking away prior to Monday's start of the annual event that rotates through the G-8 countries, the Self-Defense Forces are also stepping up security under an order by Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba against terrorist incidents including a possible airplane hijacking targeting the summit venue hotel standing on a hill beside Lake Toya.
National Police Agency officials said the agency has mobilized some 20,000 officers since late June in and near the hotel, some 750 kilometers north of Tokyo, and other areas of Hokkaido but deployed another 20,000 to various locations in the capital such as train stations and entertainment districts.
The "two-prong" police guard contrasts with the year 2000, when Japan last hosted a G-8 summit, which took place in Okinawa Prefecture some 1,500 km southwest of Tokyo. At that time, the police deployed some 20,500 officers in Okinawa but put Tokyo on no special alert.
But a series of deadly terrorist incidents in London on the sidelines of the 2005 G-8 summit in Gleneagles, far from the British capital, made Japan police raise the warning level in Tokyo to the highest, Japanese government officials said. A total of 56 people were killed in the London incidents.
The agency officials said the police are mainly prepared for possible violence by participants in anti-G-8 summit rallies in Hokkaido as various groups plan to stage such rallies and demonstrations in places such as Hokkaido's prefectural capital Sapporo, and Date, near the lake.
The police say they will also closely watch the situation in Sapporo, where the leaders from China and South Korea plan to stay.
A senior NPA official said, "We're worried radical activists from foreign countries could incite people into violent acts and that that could result in a large-scale clash."
Meanwhile, the SDF have flown aircraft including an information gathering AWACS airplane of the Air Self-Defense Force in and near Hokkaido, with SDF officers saying one serious concern is a possible terrorist attack from the air against the summit venue.
The transport ministry has already announced it will set a no-fly zone within a 46-km radius of the hotel from Sunday to Wednesday.
The Maritime Self-Defense Force has deployed several destroyers to waters near Hokkaido while the Ground Self-Defense Force will fly some 20 helicopters to carry participants in the G-8 summit between New Chitose Airport and relevant locations such as the Lake Toya area, ministry officials said.