President of Japan's biggest boyband agency quits over sex abuse scandal

The president of Japan's biggest boyband agency announced Thursday her resignation to "take responsibility" for its late founder's decades-long alleged sexual abuse of young proteges seeking stardom.

The announcement by Julie Fujishima, a niece of the accused music mogul Johnny Kitagawa, came a week after an external panel published a damning report faulting her for longtime inaction.

Kitagawa died of a stroke aged 87 in 2019, having engineered the birth of J-pop mega-groups including SMAP, TOKIO and Arashi that amassed adoring fans across Asia.



Allegations of abuse surfaced in Japanese media in 1999 but it wasn't until early this year that they ignited full-on soul-searching, following a BBC documentary and denunciations by victims.

Fujishima, who said she had stepped down on Tuesday, named singer and actor Noriyuki Higashiyama, a veteran member of the talent agency, as her successor.