Japan PM under fire for playing golf as trawler sank

TOKYO, Japan -- Japan's prime minister came under fire Sunday for continuing with a game of golf after hearing a U.S. nuclear submarine had struck a Japanese trawler.

Most major newspapers carried front-page articles and editorials attacking Yoshiro Mori's decision to finish a round of golf on Saturday morning after he heard that the Japanese trawler had sunk off Hawaii.

Nine people, including four 17-year-old students from a fisheries school, were still missing on Sunday more than 24 hours after the 6,900-ton U.S. nuclear attack submarine USS Greeneville surfaced and struck the 499-ton Ehime Maru.

"I don't know how the prime minister first heard of it, but I think he should have stopped playing golf immediately and returned to his office," Takenori Kanzaki, leader of the New Komeito party and the key partner in Mori's ruling coalition, told a television talkshow.

'We took the safest course of action': Mori

Mori insisted his decision had been correct, saying it is unwise to get flustered in moments of crisis.

"It would not get any of us anywhere if I rushed to (the prime minister's official residence) and got all flustered, without receiving reports," Mori told reporters. "We took the safest course of action."

Mori, who had been playing golf at a country club near Yohohama, received word of the accident at around 10:30 a.m. (0130 GMT) a.m. and left for Tokyo shortly before 1 p.m.

"Prime Minister waits four hours" screamed the headline on the front page of the Asahi Shimbun newspaper.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda said Mori's decision had caused no problems since he was issuing instructions from the golf course by mobile telephone.

Newspapers leapt on Mori's decision, quoting defense experts and political analysts as saying the prime minister took too long to grasp the gravity of the situation.

Timing could not be worse

A survey of voters by the daily Mainichi Shimbun last week showed support for Mori, battered by scandals that have felled three cabinet ministers and his reputation for blunders, at a mere 14 percent.

He is not the first Japanese Prime Minister to come under attack for allegedly taking a crisis too lightly.

His predecessor, the late Keizo Obuchi, was criticized for going for a haircut just five minutes after his cabinet set up a task force to deal with the aftermath of a Tokyo subway train collision that killed three people and injured 31 last March.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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