3 Taiwanese women arrested over powder scattered at Kyoto castle

Does Japan not have freedom of religion?

I'm confused by your confusion. You're free to practice any religion as long as you don't cause any harm to others. Not the case here, the authorities are right to treat this with a heavy hand, given the many terrorism cases happening recently.

The women, who left Japan after the incident, re-entered Japan on April 18 when they arrived at Narita airport near Tokyo, and were taken into custody by Kyoto police...They were in possession of powder weighing 1.2 kilograms, similar to the one scattered at the castle a year ago, at the time of their arrest, according to the police.

Dumb.

One thing is for sure. If you muck about at shrines or temples...they will catch you!

This has to be the 20th time over the years I hear about someone being caught for past crimes at a shrine.

Fine them for the cost of clean-up and inspection.

so you can't take a bottle of water on a plane, but 1.2kg of brown powder is OK?

Pay backs are a bitch.

This is disappointing for Taiwan, who for many, are seen as being apart from China. This type of disrespect can be expected from the mainland, but Taiwan should try to distance itself from such abhorrent acts

It's hard to understand some of these Cults...

It is not abhorrent exactly as it is just powder which will blow away presuumably, but it does sound ignorant, at least, and nuts at best without further explanation. Tinfoil hats, anyone? Nijo Jo is not really famous for mass killings as far as I know, and no real battles were fought there. In the meantime I hope they let us know their real reasons for flying to a foreign country, twice, with bags of incense to spread around famous buildings.

idiots....I hate stupid people

Perhaps I was misunderstood. I was not defending vandalism or the women. The story opens using the word "blotted", (not vandalized) the women says "sprinkled incense powder (at the castle) to purify the souls of the deceased.", then "temporarily closed for an inspection" (not clean-up).

And "In February 2015, Ninomaru Palace was vandalized with an oily liquid." (Where is the connection to this case?)

As I always see small mounds of salt (white power sustains) at the entrance of and in and around shrines and temples, I wonder if their intentions as stated are true or not. Therefore, would have liked to see photos.

If they were ashes of a body I would understand the concern, but this makes no sense to me.

admitted to the allegation, saying they "sprinkled incense powder (at the castle) to purify the souls of the deceased.

Read it three times. Confused. Where is the crime? Does Japan not have freedom of religion? This said, pictures would have been a plus to this article.