Police found three bodies in a van in Hyogo on Tuesday. This followed an earlier group suicide that left two women dead and a man seriously injured on Monday. In both cases charcoal was burnt to cause death by asphyxia.

According to reports, at least 21 people have died during March in group suicides. It is still unclear whether the latest two groups met on the internet or not.

Internet suicides comment
While Internet-linked suicides rose around 80% (guesstimate) in 2005, the number of cases is very small: 91 people in 2005. This is a tiny fraction of total suicides in Japan which has well in excess of 30,000 deaths annually. In fact the total suicides by Internet reflect about one day’s worth of total suicides…

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