Thousands of Flowers Uprooted As Vandals Target Japan's Parks

Attempts by city planners to add a little natural color to Japan's urban centers are being ruined - by a spate of copycat attacks targeting thousands of meticulously arranged beds of flowers and plants.

The latest act of vandalism came this weekend, when more than 200 pansies were pulled out of the ground early on Sunday morning in Saitama prefecture, north of Tokyo.

Similar crimes have been reported in at least nine other locations, including Fukuoka, in the south-west, where the organizers of a tulip festival arrived at the site to find 2,000 flowerbeds mown down by a car.

Increased security at public spaces and flower show venues has failed to stem the tide of floral vandalism.

Police in Gunma prefecture patrolled public flowerbeds after more than 1,000 tulips were cut down earlier this month, but failed to stop another 800 from coming to a similarly miserable end late last week.

Instead of savoring an early-summer explosion of color in some of Japan's dourest city precincts, residents are now wondering whether the beautification of their hometowns is worth the bother.

Kiyoto Oikawa, a residents' association chairman in one targeted neighborhood, told the Yomiuri newspaper the crimes "trample on people's feelings. I'm bitterly disappointed".

Police have yet to identify a consistent motive for the attacks, which experts speculated could be a high-profile form of stress relief.

The only arrest has been of a man who was caught uprooting a single tulip - possibly a gift for a loved one - from a pavement flowerbed. "I was drunk. It was just a bit of fun," he was quoted as telling police.