About 5,400 residents were evacuated in Osaka in western Japan and highways were closed today as army experts disposed of a large unexploded bomb believed to have been dropped by the US military during the Second World War, authorities said.

Psychiatrists have concluded a former cult leader sentenced to die for the deadly 1995 nerve gas attack on the Tokyo underground rail system is mentally fit to stand trial if his appeal goes ahead, a court official said today.

Japan has frozen all financial aid to Burma, intensifying pressure on the Southeast Asian nation’s military junta to release pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.