Anger as Japanese minister visits ‘war crimes’ shrine

JAPAN - Japan’s defence minister, Tomomi Inada, has provoked anger in South Korea following a visit to a controversial war shrine in Tokyo, a day after she accompanied the prime minister, Shinzo Abe, on his reconciliatory trip to Pearl Harbor. South Korea’s foreign ministry denounced as “deplorable” Inada’s visit to Yasukuni, a site it said “beautifies past colonial invasions and invasive war and honors war criminals”. The defense ministry in Seoul said: “We express deep concern and regret over Japan’s defense minister visiting Yasukuni shrine, even as our government has been emphasizing the need to create a new, forward-looking South Korea-Japan relationship.” Inada, a prominent right-winger who has been tipped as a future prime minister, made the pilgrimage to the contentious shrine on Thursday morning – her first since becoming defense minister in August. As an MP she had made the trip every 15 August – the anniversary of Japan’s wartime defeat – between 2006 and 2015. Television footage showed a smiling Inada arriving at the shrine, which honors 2.5 million Japanese war dead, including several leaders executed for war crimes. She told reporters that her visit was intended to “create peace for Japan and the world”. “This year the president of the country that dropped the atomic bomb visited Hiroshima and the prime minister made remarks of consolation at Pearl Harbor,” Inada said, in a reference to Barack Obama’s highly symbolic trip to Hiroshima in May.

“I visited the shrine wishing to firmly create peace for Japan and the world from a future-oriented perspective.” Asked if she risked prompting a diplomatic backlash from South Korea and China, she said: “I think that no matter what their historical views are and whether they were friends or foes, they understand my paying respects to those who dedicated their lives to their country.”

(Theguardian.com)