Contingency bills must be thoroughly discussed and scrapped: JCP Ichida

Ichida Tadayoshi, Japanese Communist Party Secretariat head, called for a thorough discussion of the contingency bills and their abolition at the start of deliberations in the House of Councilors on May 19. The Upper House special committee on contingency legislation also began discussing the bills on the same day.

The bills that pave the way for the Self-Defense Forces to take part in war actions with the U.S. forces were sent to the Upper House after they passed in the Lower House on May 16.

Pointing out that the bills, after being amended by the ruling parties and the opposition Democratic Party, were never discussed in the Lower House or publicly before the vote was taken, Ichida said important constitutional issues remain unresolved and demanded a thoroughgoing discussion be held in the Upper House.

He also criticized the government for seeking to invoke the contingency laws if the U.S. forces carry out preemptive attacks on another country, saying, "This is something that Japan, with its war-renouncing Article 9 of the Constitution, must not do."

He said that the Defense Agency director general's recent remarks affirming the invocation of the contingency laws "not only tramples upon the U.N. Charter but ignores Japan's responsibility for its past war of aggression in Asia in the 20th century."

In concluding his questioning, Ichida referred to an appeal issued by 30 South Korean lawmakers warning that the contingency laws will reproduce the suffering which Asian countries and peoples underwent in the last war. Quoting the appeal calling on Japan to respect the constitutional principle of peace, Ichida emphasized that the war bills must be scrapped.

Prime Minister Koizumi Jun'ichiro in answer alleged that the bills would be invoked "within the framework of the Japanese Constitution and the U.N. Charter. (end)