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Citizens and history textbook authors petition Education Ministry for retraction of order

 

Citizens and history textbook authors, along with Okinawafs five Dietmembers, on December 4 visited the Education Ministry to request that its order to remove from history textbooks accounts that the Japanese army forced civilians to commit gmass suicidesh during the Battle of Okinawa in WWII be revoked.

 

An education ministry official said to the petitioners, gGiven the historiansf theories (concerning the emass suicidesf during the Battle of Okinawa), it is hard to conclude that in all cases of emass suicidef people were ordered by the Japanese army to kill themselves.h

 

The official also said, gThe textbook examiners reached the conclusion based on the discussion at the examinersf panel, so it is impossible for the Ministry to revoke it.  Redrafted textbooks submitted by publishers are being examined.h

 

At a news conference on the same day, Ishiyama Hisao, a history textbook author and chairman of the History Educationalist Conference of Japan, criticized the ministry for repeating the same response as the one it gave in July to an Okinawan delegation.

 

Tawara Yoshifumi, a member of the Tokyo Metropolitan Association on the Battle of Okinawa, a group supporting the effort to disseminate factual information about the Battle of Okinawa, said, gI felt that the Education Ministry is trying to settle this dispute through allaying Okinawansf indignation by allowing publishers to submit redrafted textbooks for approval, while refusing to revoke the opinion the examination panel has given. This response is clearly contradictory. If this contradiction is to be solved, the examination panelfs opinion must be revoked.h

 

   Six publishers have so far redrafted their textbooks to include accounts that gmass suicideh had been forced on Okinawans by the Japanese Army, and submitted them to the ministry for approval. Experts have given their opinions at the request of the ministry.

 

After the news conference, petitioners and supporters held a rally in the Diet. Matsuda Hiroshi, the chair of Okinawa-ken High School and Handicapped Peoplefs School Teacherfs Union, said, gAs an educator, it is our duty to correct mistakes. We can not evade this duty.h

 

Participants included JCP members of the House of Representatives Akamine Seiken, Ishii Ikuko, Kasai Akira, and Kokuta Keiji and JCP members of the House of Councilors Kami Tomoko, Hini Souhei, and Yamashita Yoshiki. Dietmembers from the Social Democratic Party and the Democratic Party of Japan as well as progressive independent member Itokazu Keiko attended the rally.
-Akahata, December 5, 2007

 

 




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