J-Alert warning system to be installed at Diet in response to North Korean missile launches

The Yomiuri Shimbun

14:11 JST, October 31, 2022

The House of Representatives is arranging with the government to install reception equipment for the J-Alert national instantaneous warning system in the National Diet.

In response to a series of ballistic missile launches by North Korea, the House of Representatives has decided such a system is necessary for crisis management in the Diet. The House of Councillors will also consider introducing the system in line with the House of Representatives.

The J-Alert system, which alerts the public to an emergency such as a missile launch or an earthquake, began operating in February 2007. Based on the Civil Protection Law, government agencies and other organizations are equipped to receive J-Alerts, but the Diet is exempt from the law.

Currently, in the event of an emergency, House of Representatives staffers send in-house warnings in response to television broadcasts and the disaster radio of Tokyo’s Chiyoda Ward, which delays the announcement by about one minute compared to J-Alert. Some members of the Liberal Democratic Party have expressed concern over the lack of a sense of crisis in the highest organ of state power.