12-year-old girl apparently jumps to her death in Osaka; leaves suicide note

A 12-year-old girl was found dead in the compound of a public housing building in Tondabayashi, Osaka Prefecture, on Sunday morning after apparently jumping to her death. Police said they believe the first-year student in junior high school jumped from her room on the eighth floor of the building.

She left a note, saying, "I will commit suicide. Goodbye," according to police. While she did not refer to bullying in the note, some of her classmates said she had been teased about her body shape when she was a sixth-grader in elementary school, police said. The school she was attending said it cannot yet confirm if she had faced bullying and that it will investigate her suicide through questioning students.

14-year-old boy found dead in Nara in apparent suicide

A 14-year-old boy was found dead in an apparent suicide at his home in Nara City on Monday evening, the local fire department said.

The boy, a third-year student at a local junior high school, was found hanged around 6 p.m. His heart and lungs already ceased functioning when rescue workers arrived, officials said. He was later pronounced dead at a hospital. The principal of the junior high school said he was "not aware of any evidence of bullying, and both the parents and the school have no clue."

Education ministry establishes task force to tackle bullying

The education ministry on Tuesday set up a task force tackling bullying at schools in the wake of children's suicides stirred by bullying, its officials said.

At its first meeting, Yasuko Ikenobo, senior vice minister of education, culture, sports, science and technology who heads the task force, said, "I hope we could face the bullying issue by examining our past measures against it." The task force is expected to map out concrete measures to develop cooperative systems among local communities, schools and administrative bodies, according to the officials.

Junior high school students apologize to father for bullying his deceased son

Male students of a junior high school in Chikuzen, Fukuoka Prefecture, have apologized to the father of a 13-year-old boy who committed suicide last week over being bullied, the father said early Saturday. The second-year student left notes, in which he said, "I cannot live anymore because of the bullying."

The father quoted one of the students who visited him as saying, "I may have said something wrong to him. I want to apologize." Another student said, "Me, too. I may have done something wrong," according to the 40-year-old father. "Those students appear to have been troubled in their minds and visited me," the father said. "I don't know how to explain my feelings about them."