Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Friday expressed “utmost grief” for the “immeasurable damage and suffering” Japan inflicted in World War II, but said that future generations of Japanese should not have to keep apologising for the mistakes of the past.
Marking the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II, Abe also said he upheld past official apologies including a landmark 1995 statement by then-premier Tomiichi Murayama. But the conservative leader offered no new apology of his own.
The legacy of the war still haunts relations with China and South Korea, which suffered under Japan’s sometimes brutal occupation and colonial rule before Tokyo’s defeat in 1945. Beijing and Seoul had made clear they wanted Abe to stick to the 1995 “deep remorse” and “heartfelt apology” for Japanese “colonial rule and aggression”.
The remarks by Abe, who is seen by critics as a revisionist who wants to play down the dark side of Japan’s wartime past, will be analysed not only in China and South Korea but by ally the United States, which wants to see regional tension ease.
Abe’s conservative political allies have urged him to end what they see as a humiliating cycle of apologies that distracts from Japan’s post-war record of peace.
(With inputs from Reuters)
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