Fire guts former house of ex-premier Yoshida, short circuit suspected

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YOKOHAMA, March 22 Kyodo -
An early Sunday morning fire gutted a former residence of Shigeru Yoshida, who
was Japan's prime minister when the country signed a peace treaty with the
Allied nations in 1951, in Kanagawa Prefecture, local police said, adding they
suspect a short circuit was its cause.
No one was injured in the fire, which broke out around 6 a.m. and was
extinguished by 12:30 p.m. after burning down the all-cypress, 890-square-meter
structure and trees surrounding the two-story uninhabited house. The burned
area reached some 1,000 square meters, or about a 30th of the
33,000-square-meter premises of the residence.
Police said an alarm for an electric leakage detector, set up in the guard's
room of the house, was ringing at the time of the fire, indicating it was
caused by an electricity leak. The house had a guard around the clock.
Yoshida served as prime minister after World War II in the 1940s and 1950s.
Representing Japan, he signed the peace treaty in San Francisco with the Allied
nations in 1951. Japan also concluded a bilateral security treaty with the
United States the same year.
Located in the town of Oiso, the house was where Yoshida sometimes held talks
with visiting foreign leaders while in office.
In 1979, more than a decade after his death, it became the venue of a meeting
between then Prime Minister Masayoshi Ohira and then U.S. President Jimmy
Carter.
Yoshida's grandson and incumbent Prime Minister Taro Aso, who spent his early
childhood in the house, released a statement saying he ''deeply regrets'' the
fire as it occurred in ''a building that holds fond memories for me.''
According to the Oiso municipal government's website, the house was built in
1884 by Yoshida's stepfather. The vast premises also house a building for
distinguished guests and a garden.
The police said they believe the fire started on the second floor of the house,
as it was the part damaged most severely.
The house, currently owned by Seibu Railway Co., has a gate, which was locked
at the time of the fire. It is also surrounded by barbed wire.
Local residents expressed shock at the fire. ''I'm so shocked. I'm
speechless,'' said Emiko Momose, a 62-year-old homemaker who lives nearby. She
had visited the premises a few days earlier.
The premises have been occasionally opened for sightseeing tours held by the
municipal government in recent years. Visitors needed to register for the tours
in advance and were allowed to enter only the garden within the premises.
The police initially said they were looking into the possibilities of both
arson and an accident. In Kanagawa, suspected arson cases have occurred at
historical buildings in recent years, including one in May 2007 at a former
residence of the late U.S. architect Jay H. Morgan in Fujisawa.
The Morgan house, while being repaired after the incident, was hit by another
fire in January 2008 and was almost completely destroyed.
On March 15 this year, a former villa of the 16th family head of the Sumitomo
industrial conglomerate in Yokohama was burned down in a case of suspected
arson. The two-story building was designated as a nationally important cultural
property.
Municipal officials said the Kanagawa prefectural government is slated to buy
the premises of the former Yoshida residence from the railway operator to turn
it into a public park by fiscal 2011.
Kyodo