Support groups are stepping up efforts to prevent sexual assaults in Kumamoto Prefecture, where they say safety remains a concern in the wake of last month's deadly earthquakes.

Representatives of the groups said they cannot say how many attacks, if any, have taken place since the temblors began. But they are warning that conditions are less than ideal for women, citing the lack of single-sex changing rooms and other privacy issues.

Harmony, a semi-public gender equality promotion center in the city of Kumamoto, has distributed hundreds of fliers in the wake of the disaster. It has done so not only to warn women, but also to raise awareness among those running the shelters, who are primarily men, said Fumiyo Tango, an official with Harmony's general affairs division, said by phone on Friday.

"We have received many phone calls from people involved in gender equality fields saying we should watch out for sexual violence," Tango said. "We don't want to see a single case in Kumamoto."

The flier cites actual cases of assault or attempted sexual assault that took place following the 1995 Great Hanshin Earthquake and the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake in the Tohoku region.

The incidents include a woman in her 20s who said a strange man tried to crawl under her blanket one night, girls ranging in age from 6 to 12 who were asked for kisses by strangers, and a woman in her 30s who said she was forced to breast-feed in front of other people, including men.

The flier urges women and children to avoid walking around alone and to speak out and report to authorities if they are victimized.

Tango said that when she and her staff visited 16 evacuation centers, they noticed the lack of privacy for women at some facilities, such as for changing clothes or doing laundry away from the public eye. She said they asked the centers to improve conditions.

Emiko Munakata, head of the Miyagi Prefecture-based nonprofit group Equal Net Sendai, who helped female victims of the March 2011 Tohoku quake, said the lack of privacy causes severe stress among evacuees.

As of Thursday afternoon, 16,357 people were sheltering at 371 evacuation centers, according to the Kumamoto Prefectural Government.

"The more prolonged the evacuation becomes, the higher the chances become of women falling prey to violence," Munakata said.

"In Tohoku, it was often the case that women were made responsible for running soup kitchens while almost all the leaders of the evacuation centers were men," she said.

"In such settings, it's hard for women to fully express their concerns."

Female crime victims can call these numbers:

  • Kumamoto Prefectural Police: 0120-8343-81 (toll free)/ 096-384-1254.

  • Kumamoto City Domestic Violence Hotline: 096-344-3322.

  • Your Side Kumamoto, a support center for victims of sexual violence: 096-386-5555.

  • Kumamoto Prefecture consultation center for women (domestic abuse cases): 096-381-7110.