Two wives and three daughters of Red Army Faction terrorists who hijacked a Japan Airlines jet in 1970 and ordered it to North Korea issued a statement Tuesday saying they want to return to Japan as soon as possible.
In a statement read by an official from their Tokyo-based support group, the five said, "Our home is Japan. We would like to press the Japanese government to issue us travel documents."
Yukio Yamanaka, who has just returned from the North after meeting with the five to arrange for their departure, told reporters the support group hopes to see them fly to Japan early next year.
Yamanaka, secretary general of the Kyuen Renraku Center, which is applying for the travel documents on behalf of the five, traveled to Pyongyang to receive letters of commission from them.