Located in Central Tokyo, Yasukuni Temple hails many controversies as it also honors war criminals from the WWII era. (Image via Japan Guide)

Unable to visit, Abe sends plant offering to Yasukuni Shrine

Alfonsus Adi Putra
Politics & Economic
News Flash Japan
Oct 17, 2019
1746
On Thursday, the Prime Minister of Japan, Shinzo Abe, sent an offering to Yasukuni Shrine, Central Tokyo. The offering marked the start of the four-day Autumn Festival which will run until Sunday. For the offering, Abe sent a branch of “masakaki” evergreen tree.

The sources reported that Abe’s inability to visit the shrine was because he was scheduled to visit the northeastern region to monitor the devastation caused by typhoon no. 19, dubbed as Typhoon Hagibis.

According to government sources and the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), Abe would not be visiting the Yasukuni Shrine for the Autumn Festival. However, it was expected that the Japanese PM would send an offering for the Autumn Festival.

Although the Chief Cabinet Secretary, Yoshihide Suga, said that Abe’s decision to visit the shrine was still up in the air, the “masakaki” offering answered “No”.

Since his reign in 2012, Abe only visited the shrine once, in 2012, and stopped visiting the shrine since December 2013. While he remains absent, Abe sent offerings for Spring and Autumn Festivals, and cash every 15 August when the Japanese remember the V-P Day, the day when Japan surrendered to the Allied Forces on 15 August 1945.

This might be an attempt of the Japanese government to maintain its image and bilateral relations with its neighboring countries, China and South Korea (S. Korea), having once oppressed by the Japanese during WWII.

The visitation to the shrine is known to frown the Chinese and S. Korean leaders. Yasukuni Shrine was known to be honoring more than 2.4 million war heroes from WWII, even more than a dozen war criminals.

Recently, the bilateral relations between Japan and S. Korea touched its lowest since the S. Korean Supreme Court ruled the Japanese companies in S. Korea to compensate for wartime labor during Japanese colonial rule over the Korean Peninsula in 1910 - 1945.

While Japan said that the dispute had been resolved in 1965 accord, Tokyo imposed export curb for chemical components to S. Korea. Also, Japan erases S. Korea from its “whitelist”, to which S. Korea also did the same.

For the enthronement of Emperor Naruhito held next week, the Prime Minister of S. Korea, Lee Nak-yeon is scheduled to visit Japan and meet his Japanese counterpart. Among the topics, it is rumored that both PMs could be discussing the trade frictions between Japan and S. Korea and the resolution.

Following Abe’s stead, other lawmakers such as Taro Kono (Japan’s Minister of Defense), Shinjiro Koizumi (Minister of the Environment), and more lawmakers aligned with Abe’s LDP stated that they had not decided whether they would make a visit yet. However, most probably that they would not make any visit due to their agendas due to the Hagibis. Koizumi had visited the shrine on the V-P Day.

However, an LDP politician also the member of the Diet responsible for Okinawa Prefecture, Seiichi Eto, was reported to visit the shrine on Thursday as informed by Eto’s office.

Source: https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20191017_11/

Politics , Culture , Asia , Japan , Autumn-Festival , Shinzo-Abe