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Japan's call for a cut in its contribution to U.N. budget will bring discredit on itself
Akahata editorial

The United Nations has begun to discuss the ratio of members' contributions for the 2003-2007 period. Japanese Ambassador Ozawa Toshiro complained that Japan is not given a permanent UNSC seat although its contribution is larger than those of four permanent Security Council members combined excluding the United States. He called for a system in which ability to pay is better reflected (October 17, U.N. General Assembly Fifth Committee). Ozawa's statement represents in more specific terms Foreign Minister Machimura Nobutaka's general speech to the General Assembly that Japan may cut its share of contribution if Japan is denied a permanent UNSC seat.

Linking Japan's share of contributions to a UNSC permanent seat will undermine the international trust of Japan.

A U.N. member's share of contribution is determined in proportion to its ratio of gross national income (GNI), adjusted by an internationally agreed formula so that economic powers shoulder some of the developing countries' burdens.

Japan's share for the 2003-2005 period was determined based on the methods that Japan proposed when revision was discussed in 2000. Thus, it was decided that the United States, ranking top in GNI, should pay 22 percent, while Japan in second place should pay 19.47 percent (about 37 billion yen in 2005).

Sato Yukio, international affairs research institute director and U.N. ambassador at that time, stated in the Diet, "As the United States reduced its share from 25 percent to 22 percent, Japan also cut one percent in its share. We had the computation formula changed. This proposal was supported by developing countries by taking their full share (May 8, 2003, House of Representatives Constitution Research Commission subcommittee)."

In the light of the above decision-making process of determining the ratio of contribution, it is natural that Japan's call for cuts in Japan's share unless it is given a permanent UNSC seat will face world criticism as a selfish demand.

Japan became a U.N. member by promising that it will never play any military role because of its war-renouncing Article 9 of the Constitution. Japan has contributed to world peace by playing a positive role in non-military fields, such as the sharing of contributions to the U.N. and its Official Development Assistance. Japan must not forget the starting point of the United Nations as well as the resolution it made in joining the U.N.

Support for Japan's becoming a permanent UNSC member is very small because the Japanese government is reluctant to admit that it was wrong for Japan to wage the war of aggression. What's more, Prime Minister Koizumi Jun'ichiro has visited five times the shrine that justifies the war of aggression, thus angering other Asians.

Joseph Nye, U.S. Harvard University professor who once served as U.S. Assistant Secretary of Defense and who redefined the Japan-U.S. Security Treaty, stated that some countries that are irritated at Japan's refusal to reflect on its wartime past will vote against it becoming a permanent UNSC member. Henry Hyde, U.S. House International Relations Committee chairman, in a letter to Japanese Ambassador to the U.S. Ryozo Kato on October 20 wrote that unless Japan has a constructive dialogue with its regional neighbors, it will benefit neither Japan nor the U.S.

It is natural that no country in the world supports the Koizumi government's stance that goes against the United Nations' fundamental idea of reflecting on the past wars of aggression by Japan, Germany, and Italy.

The Constitution of Japan, which was established based on a reflection on the war of aggression, declares that Japan renounces war, and gives up on war potential, and the right of belligerency. Bearing a principle of peace relayed from the principle of the U.N. Charter obliging its members to solve international disputes peacefully, Japan's Constitution is now a focus of international attention.

If Japan takes positive diplomatic steps under the constitutional principles of peace, it will help Japan regain its trust in Asia and the rest of the world. -- Akahata, October 25, 2005