FOCUS: New 'hawkish' foreign minister may ruffle feathers in Asia

0 Comments | Asian Political News, Nov 7, 2005

TOKYO, Nov. 1 Kyodo

At a time when Japan is struggling to mend strained ties with China and South Korea, the appointment Monday of Taro Aso, known for his hawkish views, as foreign minister could not have come at a worse time, political pundits say.

Speaking at his first press conference at the Foreign Ministry on Monday night, Aso said he does not think the issue of Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's visits to the war-related Yasukuni Shrine is as big as it appears to be in the media.

''The more fuss over the issue, the worse things will get,'' he said, urging media organizations in Japan not to further fan the furor in Asia over Koizumi's repeated visits to the shrine, which honors Japanese war criminals along with the war dead.

Political analyst Minoru Morita said that in making such a remark Aso shows he is out of touch with reality, given that the shrine visits regularly draw flak from Asian nations and around the world.

Aso's appointment, Morita said, shows the ''dangers of an arrogant diplomacy'' which may ''mislead'' the country, the way it did in the past prior to and during the war years.

China, South Korea and other Asian countries, which suffered Japanese military aggression before and during World War II, see the shrine as symbolic of unrepentant Japanese militarism and regard visits to it by Japanese leaders as insensitive and insulting.

Koizumi has nevertheless visited the shrine in Tokyo five times since assuming office in April 2001.

His latest visit on Oct. 17 has affected Japan's diplomatic schedule, such as the cancellation last month of a visit to China by Aso's predecessor Nobutaka Machimura. South Korean President Roh Moo Hyun's planned visit to Japan, possibly in December, for talks with Koizumi also appears uncertain.

Machimura, in his last press conference at the ministry, indicated the big impact the prime minister's shrine visits have on Japan's Asian diplomacy and said he himself did not visit the shrine during his tenure due to concerns Japan may not even be able to hold working-level talks with China and South Korea if both Japan's premier and foreign minister make such visits.

Whether or not Aso will follow his predecessor by not visiting Yasukuni and how he will fare in the diplomatic arena remain to be seen.

But looking at his past positions and remarks, Aso could himself become the cause of diplomatic problems involving Yasukuni -- a development Morita fears would worsen the already strained ties with China and South Korea.

In creating a ''hard-line posture'' for his Cabinet by naming Aso and another hawk, Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe, to two key posts, Koizumi is showing a ''defiant attitude to Asia'' that goes against the view that Japan is sincere in its pledge never to wage war again, Morita said.

Already, since Monday, the media in several Asian countries including China and South Korea have expressed concern that Koizumi's appointment of hard-liners in his new Cabinet will increase tension between Japan and its Asian neighbors.

The Foreign Ministry's Assistant Press Secretary Akira Chiba said it is ''premature'' to say so. But a senior Foreign Ministry official, speaking on condition of anonymity, expressed concern that Japan's Asian diplomacy would become ''quite'' difficult, especially with the prospect that all three top officials in Japan -- Koizumi, Abe and Aso -- might visit the shrine.

Abe has already indicated he would visit the shrine, while Aso, who last visited it in his capacity as internal affairs and communications minister, said he will ''make an appropriate decision.''

Morita said what Japan badly needs now is ''humility'' in its leadership -- a quality which Aso seems to lack.

What the 65-year-old veteran lawmaker does have is a strong drive to promote central government policies such as the recent agreement with the United States over the U.S. military realignment in Japan, which has sparked protests by local communities hosting the U.S. forces.

Japan and the United States agreed last week to build an airfield using part of the coastal land of U.S. Camp Schwab in Nago, Okinawa, and over some reclaimed land northeast of the camp to relocate the heliport functions of the U.S. Marine Corps' Futemma Air Station, which currently sits in the center of a residential area in Ginowan, also in Okinawa Prefecture.

But Okinawa Gov. Keiichi Inamine and other local officials rejected the plan.

''What has been basically agreed will remain unchanged,'' Aso maintained at a news conference Tuesday.

But the road ahead appears rocky, with Okinawa Prefecture and other host communities in other parts of Japan expressing strong objections to the contents of the Japan-U.S. interim report on the U.S. military realignment in Japan.

In a bid to reach out to the local communities amid such opposition, Aso said minor changes could be made before the final report on overall plans for the U.S. military realignment in Japan is adopted by the two countries in March.