By Ju-min Park and Antoni Slodkowski
TOKYO (Reuters) – Men and women of all ages defied the fiery heat amid the COVID-19 pandemic to pay tribute to Tokyo’s debatable Yasukuni Shrine on Saturday, the 75th anniversary of the end of World War II in Japan.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe sent a ritual to the sanctuary for the war dead, which will also pay three times to some convicted war criminals, but avoids a non-public act that would anger China and South Korea.
Here are some comments from those who visited the shrine on Saturday.
AYAKA SOMA, 27, INDEPENDENT CHERCHEUR
“Let’s not communicate about the past, let’s take a look at the future. I hope Japan and South Korea can get close. We have never lived through the war and we have to tell the other young people to come and pray here.”
YOSHINORI IWAMI, 54, SMALL BUSINESS OWNER
“I arrived here on behalf of my mother’s two older brothers who died in the war in the Solomon Islands. This is an opportunity for me to come back in combination and reconnect with my family’s roots. I came here to pay homage as a Japanese. It’s if you’re on the right or left.”
“I don’t understand why South Koreans criticize the Japanese for paying homage to those killed in the war. We pay pure tribute to our dead in war, like all other countries in the world.”
Iwami said he arrived at the shrine early Saturday morning to defeat the crowd and surprised by the biggest turnout.
MEGUMI TANIGUCHI, 59, CONSTRUCTION CONSULTANT
“Even after the war, the emperor came here and the prime ministers were also present. This factor has been politicized since the 1960s and 1970s. They for their own national political reasons.”
“I need our Prime Minister to come here and I would like the emperor, as the incarnation of Japan, to come here at least once every five years.”
(Reporting through Ju-min Park and Antoni Slodkowski; edited through William Mallard)