The latest visit to the Yasukuni Shrine, which honors Japanese
war criminals, by Japan's Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's met
with strong protests from China on Tuesday.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry issued a statement expressing
"strong protests" against the move which severely harmed the people
victimized by Japanese militarist aggression and damaged the
political basis of Sino-Japanese relations.
Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing summoned Japanese Ambassador to
China, Miyamoto Yuji, and lodged strong objections to Koizumi's
sixth visit to the shrine. He told Miyamoto that the repeated
visits to the shrine "challenge international justice" and
"trample?on the conscience of mankind".
"China strongly requests Japanese leaders to make efforts to
remove political barriers and bring the Sino-Japanese ties back on
track as soon as possible," Li said.
Relations between the two countries have been chilled by
Koizumi's visits to the shrine where 2.5 million Japanese war dead,
including 14 convicted class A war criminals of World War II, are
honored.
Koizumi has visited the shrine each year since coming to office
in 2001. But it's the first time he's been there on the August 15
anniversary of Japan's surrender in World War II.
The China-Japan Friendship Association, a Chinese civil group,
issued a written statement on Tuesday denouncing the visit. "His
act has severely hurt the feelings of people in China and other
Asian countries and we express our utmost indignation and strong
protest over his wrong deeds," the statement said.
More than 30 Chinese people gathered outside the Japanese
embassy in Beijing on Tuesday morning to protest against the visit.
The anger over the visit also spread to Nanjing, capital of eastern
China's Jiangsu Province, where at least 300,000
Chinese were massacred by Japanese troops in 1937.
She Ziqing, a 74-year-old survivor, raged, "How can he feel no
regret for the brutal deeds of the wartime Japanese militarists?"
he said.
In Hangzhou, capital of China's Zhejiang Province, survivors of Japan's germ
warfare in China were "indignant" over Koizumi's move.
Yang Dafang, whose father died in the germ warfare of 1940, said
Koizumi's visits to the shrine not only hurt the feelings of the
Chinese victims and their relatives but also undermined the
relations between the two countries. During the war, the Japanese
army's Unit 731, developed biological weapons and conducted
experiments on humans causing the deaths of many Chinese
people.
Chinese experts labeled Koizumi's visit "a political farce"
which they said was certain to have a damaging impact on
China-Japan relations.
"The visit to the Yasukuni Shrine is a matter concerning the
political basis for China-Japan relations and demonstrates Japan's
view of its actions during the war," said Liu Jiangyong, an expert
at?Tsinghua University.
Gao Hong, a researcher from the Chinese Academy of Social
Sciences said the successors to Koizumi would find themselves in a
difficult situation as this latest shrine visit had further soured
Tokyo's ties with China and other Asian neighbors.
"It will be hard for the statesman replacing Koizumi to deal
with the issue of the Yasukuni Shrine," said Gao. He's set to step
down in September.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe, the front-runner to replace
Koizumi, has backed the visits and went to the shrine himself on
August 15 last year. Media reports say he secretly did so again in
April. But he refused to say whether he would go there if he became
Japanese prime minister.
In Japan this latest visit also prompted protests from
opposition and coalition parties, politicians and civil groups.
Japan's three opposition parties criticized Koizumi's visit. Yukio
Hatoyama, secretary general of the main opposition Democratic Party
of Japan said "the visit was an absurd act which could not be more
irresponsible".
Japanese Communist Party leader Kazuo Shii said Koizumi's visit
"exposed his irresponsibility regarding the country's foreign
affairs" and the party lodged "a strong protest" over his
actions.
Mizuho Fukushima, head of the Social Democratic Party, said the
premier's visit was a mistake. "August 15 should be a day when we
share a pledge of no more war. But (the premier) is trying to
change the nature of the anniversary into a day of justifying
sacrifice for the state," she said.
Public opinion polls show that the Japanese people are divided
on the shrine visits. In a recent opinion poll conducted by Japan's
Yomiuri Shimbun newspaper 49 percent of the respondents
were opposed to Koizumi's visits with 43 percent in favor.
(Xinhua News Agency August 16, 2006)