Word: yasukuni
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Koizumi's appeal isn't just about cleaning up politics and fixing the economy. He is also tapping into nationalistic sentiment. He advocates tinkering with the U.S. security pact and the Constitution to give Japan's military more flexibility. Last month he visited Yasukuni, the controversial Shinto war shrine where Japan's war dead, including war criminals, are honored. "You can't overestimate how much patriotism drives his thinking," say Jesper Koll, chief economist with Merrill Lynch in Japan and a Koizumi...
...into trouble than out of it. Koizumi is close to right-wingers like Shintaro Ishihara, the Tokyo governor and Yasuhiro Nakasone, a former Prime Minister, and it was apparently on their advice that he made his first political gaffe: on Aug. 13, he paid his respects at Yasukuni, the Shinto shrine where Japan's soldiers, including indicted war criminals, are honored. The right-wingers supported him as pacifists and even mainstream politicians objected. The gesture infuriated Japan's neighbors, notably China and South Korea, who viewed the Prime Ministerial visit to the shrine as condoning Japan's wartime aggression. Koizumi...
...Japan also coincides with the rise of a new national mood. The hugely popular Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi is determined to rekindle a feeling of pride after a decade of economic doldrums. His plans to revise the constitution, which renounces any offensive military capability, and to visit the Yasukuni Shrine, a contentious memorial for dead war veterans (including World War II war criminals), have elicited outcries abroad but little to none at home. Two years ago the Diet restored the World War II-era Hinomaru flag and Emperor-worshiping Kimigayo anthem as official standard-bearers for the nation. A film...
...idea of a military build-up because that would enable the U.S. to shift some of its hardware and staff elsewhere. The rest of Asia, particularly China, would react differently. Koizumi has already perturbed neighbors by revealing a conservative nationalist streak. He has said he'll visit the controversial Yasukuni Shrine, a war memorial where veterans, including some convicted war criminals, are entombed. He has also refused to stop the publication of textbooks that whitewash Japan's aggression in World...
...film's release also coincides with a new mood in Japan. Junichiro Koizumi, the new and hugely popular Prime Minister, is determined to restore national pride; he plans to visit the Yasukuni Shrine, a memorial, which most of his predecessors have avoided, that's controversial for heralding convicted war criminals as well as other war dead. A film like Pearl Harbor, says Koizumi's spokesman, Kazuhiko Koshikawa, is "quite fictitious and one-sided. Japan is portrayed as the enemy and wrong. The U.S. is portrayed as right...