It is a routine feature on television news: Another child has been strangled, starved, beaten or otherwise fatally abused-- at the hands of the parents.
Equally routine but no less tragic is the fact that Japanese authorities in many cases knew the child was at risk but failed to intervene.
The relentless string of abuse-related deaths has exposed gaping flaws in the way Japan attends to its young. So much so that children's rights advocates are questioning whether the government is sincerely searching for a solution.