The imperial couple, the prime minister and bereaved family members will attend a government ceremony to commemorate victims of the Great East Japan Earthquake in Tokyo on March 11, the one-year anniversary of the disaster.
The imperial couple, the prime minister and bereaved family members will attend a government ceremony to commemorate victims of the Great East Japan Earthquake in Tokyo on March 11, the one-year anniversary of the disaster.
A moment of silence for private prayers will be held at 2:46 p.m., the time the temblor struck northeastern Japan.
The ceremony, which will start at 2:30 p.m. at the National Theater in Chiyoda Ward, will be attended by around 1,500 people.
The government initially considered hosting the ceremony at a venue in the quake-hit Tohoku region, but settled on Tokyo on Jan. 20.
“We decided to hold the ceremony in the capital as the three stricken prefectural governments are planning to have their own memorial services in their prefectures,” Chief Cabinet Secretary Osamu Fujimura said.
The state-run ceremony is expected to show live footage of the events in the Tohoku region to give a sense of togetherness.
The magnitude-9.0 quake and tsunami left about 20,000 people killed or missing, mostly from Fukushima, Miyagi and Iwate prefectures along the coast, making it the nation's worst disaster since World War II.