PanOrient News | North Korea Accuses Japanese Lawmakers of Reviving Militarism

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Diplomacy

North Korea Accuses Japanese Lawmakers of Reviving Militarism

Sunday, October 23, 2011

Tokyo- (PanOrient News) The Korean Central News Agency, considered to be the mouthpiece of the North Korean government, has accused "ultra-right elements" in Japan of trying to revive militarism, and the "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere".

The agency described a visit to Yasukuni Shrine by some 50 Japanese politicians as "indicative of a revival of militarism, and a mockery and unacceptable insult to the Koreans and other Asian people who suffered untold misfortune at the hands of the Japanese imperialists."

A group, consisting of lawmakers from the ruling Democratic Party of Japan as well as the opposition Liberal Democratic Party, Your Party, Sunrise Party of Japan and independents, visits the shrine on Tuesday Oct. 18, for the fall festival. None of them holds a Cabinet post.

This visit, according to KCNA, showed Japan's intentions of following the ideas and will of the Japanese war criminals who were hell-bent on overseas aggression, and determined to repeat its history of aggression and crimes in the 21st century." The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) also criticized the visit as "a blatant denial of history" and "prevalent with the trend of denying its past."

Tokyo-based Yasakuni Shrine has housed the war dead since 1869 but after the 14 class A war criminals were enshrined there in 1978, Japan's neighbors have seen the annual visits of homage by its leaders as an antagonistic act toward the people who suffered at their hands.

Present Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda has stated that whilst he is in office, neither he nor his ministers will visit the shrine.

The North Korean official commentary called on Japan "to settle its past" and "to stop evading its responsibility by justifying its bitter history of aggression in the last century" and to take the opportunity to admit that this year "marks the lapse of 70 years since the Japanese imperialist started the Pacific War."

PanOrient News