Another Attempt to Deny Japan’s History by New York times

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/03/opinion/another-attempt-to-deny-japans-history.html?ref=opinion&_r=1&#h[]

EDITORIAL
Another Attempt to Deny Japan’s History
Published: January 2, 2013


¶ Few relationships are as important to stability in Asia as the one between Japan and South Korea. Yet Japan’s new prime minister, Shinzo Abe, seems inclined to start his tenure with a serious mistake that would inflame tensions with South Korea and make cooperation harder. He has signaled that he might seek to revise Japan’s apologies for its World War II aggression, including one for using Koreans and other women as sex slaves.
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¶In 1993, Japan finally acknowledged that the Japanese military had raped and enslaved thousands of Asian and European women in army brothels, and offered its first full apology for those atrocities. A broader apology by Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama in 1995 conceded that “through its colonial rule and invasion,” Japan had caused “tremendous damage and suffering to the people of many countries, particularly to those of Asian nations.”

¶ In an interview with the Sankei Shimbun newspaper, Mr. Abe, a right-wing nationalist, was quoted by Reuters on Monday as saying he wants to replace the 1995 apology with an unspecified “forward looking statement.” He said that his previous administration, in 2006-7, had found no evidence that the women who served as sex slaves to Japan’s wartime military had, in fact, been coerced. However, at a news conference last week, the chief cabinet secretary, Yoshihide Suga, said that Mr. Abe would uphold the 1995 apology but hinted he may revise the 1993 statement.

¶ It is not clear how Mr. Abe, the leader of the Liberal Democratic Party of Japan, might modify the apologies, but he has previously made no secret of his desire to rewrite his country’s wartime history. Any attempt to deny the crimes and dilute the apologies will outrage South Korea, as well as China and the Philippines, which suffered under Japan’s brutal wartime rule.

¶ Mr. Abe’s shameful impulses could threaten critical cooperation in the region on issues like North Korea’s nuclear weapons program. Such revisionism is an embarrassment to a country that should be focused on improving its long-stagnant economy, not whitewashing the past.

1 名前：そーきそばΦ ★[] 投稿日：2013/01/04(金) 07:03:36.51 ID:???0

http://headlines.yahoo.co.jp/hl?a=20130104-00000012-jij-n_ame

歴史否定の「重大な過ち」＝安倍首相を批判―米紙社説
時事通信 1月4日(金)6時8分配信
【ニューヨーク時事】米紙ニューヨーク・タイムズは3日、安倍晋三首相が12月31日付産経新聞に掲載されたインタビューで、従軍慰安婦問題を含む過去の侵略に対する日本政府の謝罪を見直す考えを示唆したとして、首相を厳しく批判する社説を掲げた。
「日本の歴史を否定する新たな試み」と題する社説は、首相が1995年の村山富市首相談話に代わる新たな談話を出す意向を示したことや、慰安婦の強制連行を直接示す資料は見つかっていないと述べたことをとらえ、「韓国との緊張を激化させ、協力を一層困難にさせるという重大な過ちで政権をスタートさせたいらしい」と指摘した。
また「安倍氏はかねて戦争の歴史を書き換える願望を隠していない。戦争犯罪の否定は韓国、中国、フィリピンを激怒させるだろう」と批判し、こうした安倍氏の「恥ずべき衝動」は北朝鮮の核開発などの問題について地域の協力を脅かす恐れがあると懸念を示した。　

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