Prime minister visits Yasukuni Shrine

Japanese Prime Minister Koizumi Jun'ichiro on April 21 made a surprise visit to Yasukuni Shrine, a war shrine in Tokyo for the war dead and Class A war criminals of World War II. The visit came only four days after the government submitted bills for wartime legislation to the Diet.

He told the press that he will not visit the shrine on August 15, the day Japan surrendered to the Allied Forces in 1945. Still, the prime minister's visit to the war shrine was a clear violation of the constitution which renounced war and established the principle of separation of state from religion.

Japanese Communist Party Chair Shii Kazuo, who was on a speaking tour of Niigata Prefecture on the same day, criticized the prime minister's war shrine visit as impermissible.

He pointed out that Yasukuni Shrine served as a symbol of Japan's militarism and war of aggression by enshrining the souls of soldiers who were forced to die for the emperor, and that even after the war, the shrine has maintained its position that Japan's war of aggression was a "just war."

Shii went on to say:

"The prime minister's visit to Yasukuni Shrine, regardless of timing or reasons, is a renewed manifestation of his approval of Japan's war of aggression. This is intolerable, and the JCP protests against the visit by the prime minister.

"The visit raises questions particularly in the light of it being the second visit following the first one on August 13, 2001, which met with severe criticisms at home and internationally, particularly in Asia. The prime minister is to blame for the folly of making the same mistake by rejecting all criticism.

"What is more, the coincidence of the visit with the submission by the government of the three "war nation" bills has grave implications.

"That the prime minister who approves of Japan's war of aggression is determined to enact these bills at all expenses suggests the dangerous character of these bills.

"The prime minister's visit at this time has shown inside and outside Japan that behind his action lies a dangerous impulse of instituting a setup of national mobilization for going to war, similar to the prewar system.

"The prime minister said that he visited the shrine because he wished repose for the war dead. The only true repose for the many people of Japan and other countries who were killed in the war should be found in Japan seriously examining the war of aggression and working to make a peaceful Japan in which Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution is truly enforced." (end)