was a Japanese freelance video journalist covering wars and conflicts, refugees, poverty, AIDS, and child education around the world. In October 2014, he was captured and held hostage by

Islamic State of Iraq and Syria An Islamic state is a state that has a form of government based on Islamic law (sharia). As a term, it has been used to describe various historical polities and theories of governance in the Islamic world. As a translation of the Arabic term ...

(ISIS) militants after entering Syria in the hopes of rescuing Japanese hostage

Haruna Yukawa Haruna may refer to: Geography * Haruna, Gunma, a town in Gunma prefecture, Japan * Mount Haruna, a dormant volcano in Gunma, eastern Honshu, Japan ** Lake Haruna, a lake on Mount Haruna Names *Haruna (name), a Japanese feminine given name and a ...

. On 30 January 2015, he was

beheaded Decapitation or beheading is the total separation of the head from the body. Such an injury is invariably fatal to humans and most other animals, since it deprives the brain of oxygenated blood, while all other organs are deprived of the ...

by his captors led by Jihadi John following the breakdown of negotiations for his release.

Biography

Goto was born on 23 October 1967 in the city of Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan. After graduating from

Hosei University is a private university based in Tokyo, Japan. The university originated in a school of law, Tōkyō Hōgakusha (, i.e. Tokyo association of law), established in 1880, and the following year renamed Tōkyō Hōgakkō (, i.e. Tokyo school of law ...

Tokyo Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and List of cities in Japan, largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, ...

in 1991, he worked for a media production company before establishing Independent Press in 1996. He also worked with U.N. organizations including

UNICEF UNICEF (), originally called the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund in full, now officially United Nations Children's Fund, is an agency of the United Nations responsible for providing humanitarian and developmental aid to ...

and the U.N. Refugee Agency. Reporting from war-torn countries around the world, especially in Africa and the Middle East, he focused on the life and humanity of the ordinary citizens in difficult times. His works include books and DVDs on

blood diamonds ''Blood Diamond'' is a 2006 American political war action thriller film directed and co-produced by Edward Zwick and starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Connelly, and Djimon Hounsou. The title refers to blood diamonds, which are diamonds ...

and child soldiers in Sierra Leone, the Rwandan conflict and its survivors, a teenage mother in an Estonian "AIDS village", and girls and education in Afghanistan. In 2006, he won the Sankei Children's Book Award for his 2005 book titled ''Daiyamondo yori Heiwa ga Hoshii'' (''I Want Peace Rather Than a Diamond''). His video reports appeared on Japanese national networks including

NHK , also known as NHK, is a Japanese public broadcaster. NHK, which has always been known by this romanized initialism in Japanese, is a statutory corporation funded by viewers' payments of a television license fee. NHK operates two terrestr ...

and

TV Asahi JOEX-DTV (channel 5), branded as (also known as EX and and stylized as TV asahi), is a television station that is owned and operated by the subsidiary of certified broadcasting holding company , itself controlled by The Asahi Shimbun Comp ...

. Goto converted to Christianity in 1997, and was a member of a United Church of Christ in Japan parish in

Den-en-chōfu is a residential neighborhood located in western Ōta in southern Tokyo, Japan. It is known as one of the most exclusive neighborhoods in Tokyo. History Den-en-chōfu was built based on the " Garden City" idea originally developed by the Brit ...

, Tokyo. In October 2014, Goto's wife, Rinko Jogo, had a baby, the couple's second child. He also had an older daughter from a previous marriage.

Kidnapping and beheading

Despite being warned three times by the Japanese government in September and October 2014, both by telephone and in person, not to return to Syria, Goto entered Syria on 24 October 2014 via Turkey to rescue a Japanese hostage,

, who had been captured by

Islamic State An Islamic state is a state that has a form of government based on Islamic law (sharia). As a term, it has been used to describe various historical polities and theories of governance in the Islamic world. As a translation of the Arabic term ...

(ISIL) militants in August. He was reportedly captured by ISIL members the following day. He appeared in a video released by ISIL militants on 20 January 2015, in which they demanded $200 million from the government of Japan for the lives of Goto and Yukawa. His mother, , made a plea to ISIL to spare her son at a press conference held at the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan in Tokyo on 23 January. On 24 January, ISIL released a picture of Goto holding a photo of decapitated Haruna Yukawa. In an audiotape accompanying the picture, Goto read a message in English blaming the Japanese government for the death of his "cellmate" and claiming that ISIL would spare Goto's life and exchange him for Sajida Mubarak Atrous al-Rishawi, an attempted suicide bomber who participated in the

2005 Amman bombings The 2005 Amman bombings were a series of coordinated suicide bomb attacks on three hotel lobbies in Amman, Jordan, on 9 November 2005. The explosions at the Grand Hyatt Hotel, the Radisson SAS Hotel, and the Days Inn started at around 20:50 ...

. On 29 January, Goto's wife, Rinko Jogo, released a plea to his captors through the

Rory Peck Trust The Rory Peck Trust is an international NGO that supports freelance journalists and their families in crisis. Based in London, UK, it provides practical assistance and support to freelance journalists worldwide, to raise their profile, promote th ...

, a UK-based organization that supports freelance journalists. On 31 January 2015, ISIL released a video that showed Goto being beheaded. It was later reported that he had been moved to the town of Tal Abyad near the Turkish border with Syria on 29 January in preparation for a possible exchange with al-Rishawi, but when it became apparent that the exchange would not be taking place, he was taken back to a location near the city of

Raqqa Raqqa ( ar, ٱلرَّقَّة, ar-Raqqah, also and ) (Kurdish: Reqa/ ڕەقە) is a city in Syria on the northeast bank of the Euphrates River, about east of Aleppo. It is located east of the Tabqa Dam, Syria's largest dam. The Hellenistic, ...

in Syria, and killed on the morning of 30 January, local time. Al-Rishawi for her part was hanged by the Jordanian government on 5 February in response to the death of pilot Muath Al-Kasasbeh.

Media coverage

Following the release of Goto's beheading video by ISIL on 31 January, many major Japanese television outlets, including

, Nippon Television, TBS,

Fuji Television JOCX-DTV (channel 8), branded as and colloquially known as CX, is a Japanese television station based in Odaiba, Minato, Tokyo, Japan. Owned and operated by the it is the key station of the Fuji News Network (FNN) and the Fuji Network S ...

, and

, suspended their normal programming schedules to provide breaking news coverage on this event. Some foreign media outlets noted a rather skeptical and critical response by the Japanese public regarding the two hostages. The Japanese public responded in a similar way to three Japanese citizens who were also taken hostage in Iraq. Public outrage of their naïveté compelled the Japanese government to bill them for their return airfare to Japan after their release. The general public sentiment in Japan towards these hostages has been that they are to be blamed for putting themselves deliberately in harm's way, while the Japanese government and taxpayers are pressured to pay the price to get them back.

Remembrance

Before Goto was murdered, a tweet he posted to

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

in 2010 went viral. , it had been re-tweeted more than 40,000 times. In it, Goto said,

Bibliography

* (July 2005, Choubunsha Publishing), * (December 2007, Choubunsha Publishing), * (December 2008, Choubunsha Publishing), * (December 2009, Choubunsha Publishing),

References

External links

Independent Press
* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Goto, Kenji Japanese journalists People from Sendai 1967 births 2015 deaths Hosei University alumni Members of the United Church of Christ in Japan Converts to Christianity Japanese people taken hostage Kidnappings by Islamists Foreign hostages in Syria Japanese terrorism victims People beheaded by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant People murdered in Syria Terrorism deaths in Syria Japanese people murdered abroad Journalists killed while covering the Syrian civil war Filmed executions Beheading videos Filmed killings in Asia