[ad_1]
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida pledged not to wage war on the anniversary of Japan’s surrender in World War II, while members of his cabinet paid homage to a controversial shrine to mark the date, a move that will anger China and South Korea.
Relations between Tokyo and China have been particularly strained this year as the Yasukuni Shrine is seen as a symbol of Japan’s past militarism, and Beijing conducted unprecedented military exercises in Taiwan following a visit by U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi earlier this month.
During the exercise, several missiles fell into the waters of Japan’s exclusive economic zone.
Kishida faced a thorny balance on Monday as the anniversary commemorates the Yasukuni Shrine, a website honoring 14 Japanese wartime leaders who were convicted by Allied tribunals as war criminals as well as those who died in the war.
Also read | Taiwan will coordinate with U.S., Japan, India to consolidate peace in Indo-Pacific
On the dovish side of the conservative Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), he has been tasked with avoiding angering international neighbors and partners, while still keeping the party’s more right-wing members happy – especially after the ouster of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe last month. After killing.
Kishida made offerings to the shrine in central Tokyo without visiting, Kyodo news agency reported. He also made offerings to the Yasukuni Shrine during festivals last year and this spring.
“We will never repeat the mistakes of war. I will continue to fulfill this firm vow,” Kishida said at a secular rally elsewhere in Tokyo, which was also attended by Emperor Naruhito.
Also read | Tropical Storm Meari hits Japan, thousands affected
“In a world where conflict continues unabated, Japan is an active leader in peace,” he said.
Video from NHK broadcaster showed that several cabinet ministers, including Economic Security Minister Sanae Takaichi, were visiting the shrine early on Monday. Earlier, Koichi Hagida, chairman of the Liberal Democratic Party’s policy research committee and a key ally of slain former prime minister Shinzo Abe, visited the site.
Earlier on Monday, Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said: “Any country should pay tribute to those who gave their lives for the country.” “Japan will continue to strengthen relations with its neighbors, including China and South Korea. “
A group of lawmakers who usually visit collectively on Aug. 15 said last week they would not do so because of the recent surge in coronavirus cases.
Abe was the last prime minister in recent memory to visit the Yasukuni Shrine while in office, in 2013 — a visit that angered China and South Korea, and was even condemned by his close ally, the United States.
In the decades since the war ended, the United States and Japan have become staunch security allies, but their legacy still haunts East Asia.
South Koreans, who mark the day as National Liberation Day, hate Japan’s colonial rule of the Korean peninsula from 1910 to 1945, while China has painful memories of the invasion and occupation of parts of the country by imperial troops from 1931 to 1945.
Kishida has pledged to significantly increase Japan’s defense budget, citing growing tensions in the regional security environment, but did not mention Abe’s dream — to revise the country’s pacifist constitution — in a recent speech, although he has spoken about it before.
[ad_2]
Source link