Kawajiri went back to Shooto to defend his Shooto Lightweight Champion against Norwegian Joachim Hansen. The match was stopped eight seconds into the first round when Hansen was disqualified for kicking Kawajiri in the groin, making Kawajiri the victor. Kawajiri came back to PRIDE in a fight against Charles Bennett whom he submitted by kneebar after 2:30 in the first round. He then made another PRIDE appearance in which he fought Chris Brennan and scored an even quicker victory 29 seconds in the first round by TKO. His next fight was a non-title bout against Per Eklund in Shooto where he scored a TKO at 4:10 into the first round.