US warns of security fears after Japan vote

By David Pilling in Tokyo
Published: July 31 2007 19:57

The US warned on Tuesday that its security relationship with Japan could be disrupted by the government’s crushing defeat in upper house elections.

US officials in Tokyo are seeking an urgent meeting with Ichiro Ozawa, leader of the triumphant Democratic Party of Japan, to urge him not to block the extension of emergency anti-terrorist legislation.

The DPJ, which won a landslide victory in upper house elections on Sunday, is threatening to veto legislation allowing Japanese ships to fuel US and other allied vessels in the Indian Ocean – an operation the US believes to be crucial to its ability to patrol Middle East seaways.

“It would be unfortunate if [the election result] spilled over into issues that hopefully Japan looks on in a non-partisan way,” said Thomas Schieffer, the US ambassador to Tokyo.

Mr Schieffer said he hoped to persuade Mr Ozawa that blocking the extension of the emergency measure on terrorism, which runs out in November, would not be in Japan’s interests.

“Japan is a responsible member of the international community and I would really hate for Japan to decide that the issue was not important any more or that they didn’t want to contribute.”

The DPJ has threatened to give Shinzo Abe, the Liberal Democratic party prime minister, a rough parliamentary ride in an attempt to force a general election. The LDP is divided on foreign policy, with some of its senior officials keen to adopt a more assertive foreign policy, while others are more wary of meddling with Japan’s pacifist constitution. Some were against Japan’s decision to send a reconstruction mission to Iraq.

Mr Schieffer said he had never met Mr Ozawa, an indication of how thin relations are between Washington and a party that has never seriously vied for power before. The ambassador said he thought the importance of the alliance went far deeper than individual relationships, but he conceded that the defeat of the LDP had changed the situation.

“We try to carry on as normal as we possibly can,” he said. “The dynamic has changed. There is no question about that. The LDP no longer controls the upper house. That is a historic change. So I don’t think any of us know exactly how that will work out.”

A hung Japanese parliament could affect US-Japan relations in other ways, analysts said.

It might make Tokyo less able, for example, to persuade the US Congress to lift a ban on selling advanced F-22 fighters to Japan. The US has upset some Japanese defence officials by refusing to sell the aircraft, because of fears of upsetting China and concern for Japan’s lax handling of classified information.

Mr Schieffer said: “Obviously you can’t sell the F-22 today because Congress says you can’t. But that doesn’t mean there might not be some time in the future that that might not be contemplated.”

FOCUS: Lack of successor in LDP enables Abe to stay despite election loss

TOKYO, July 30 KYODO

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has flunked his first major national election as ruling party head, with Japanese voters handing him a historic defeat in Sunday's polls, but he was determined to cling to power and said Monday he would not run away and leave a power vacuum.

Behind the 52-year-old prime minister's defiance of calls for him to resign following the Liberal Democratic Party's second-worst House of Councillors election performance is the lack of any obvious successor who could win the united support of the party, political analysts said.

''Despite such severe (election) results, I am prepared to face the rocky road ahead. But Japan must move on with reforms,'' Abe said in a news conference at the LDP headquarters. ''I decided to stay despite the severe circumstances because we cannot afford a political power vacuum.''

In Sunday's major setback, the ruling coalition lost not only its majority in the upper house but also seats in constituencies that had traditionally been LDP strongholds such as Shimane and Okayama prefectures.

The LDP won only 37 seats in Sunday's election, just one above the record low of 1989 that forced Prime Minister Sosuke Uno out of power.

''As LDP president, responsibility for the election lies ultimately and completely with me and I shall reflect on the things we should reflect on,'' Abe said.

The visibly crestfallen Abe, dressed in a yellow shirt and dark suit, was so soft-spoken on Monday that his voice was almost drowned by the noise of camera shutters during the half-hour news conference televised live nationwide.

Throughout his 10 months in office, whenever faced with declining support ratings in opinion polls, Abe has always shrugged it off by saying it was simply because his achievements have not been conveyed very well to the public.

Now he admits the poll results reflect voters' displeasure with the government's inadequate efforts in resolving the massive mismanagement of public pension records.

But he still attempted to justify his decision to remain in power by saying, ''I felt from the response of audiences during my nationwide canvassing that my basic policies, such as revitalizing the economy and tackling social disparities, are supported by the public.''

Tsuneo Watanabe, an adjunct fellow of Washington's Center for Strategic International Studies, said, ''The LDP has consensus not to let Abe step down because many LDP members believe if he did, a weaker leader may come up or more conflicts may develop.''

Unlike in the 1998 upper house election defeat when the party was strong enough to replace Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto with a new and reliable leader, Keizo Obuchi, LDP lawmakers are now ''so afraid to change leaders,'' Watanabe said.

The names of several candidates have been floated ever since the popularity of Abe, who scored an easy victory in the LDP presidency race last September largely due to expectations he could lead the party to election victory, began plummeting months into his administration due to a spate of scandals and gaffes by his Cabinet's ministers.

But support for the frontrunner, Foreign Minister Taro Aso, has diminished as a result of his recent remarks that offended Alzeheimer's patients. Meanwhile, other possible candidates, such as former Finance Minister Sadakazu Tanigaki and former Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda, appear to be taking a wait-and-see attitude.

Ahead of the election, one of the LDP's top executives said, ''There are no alternative candidates so all we can do is to have Prime Minister Abe remain in office a little longer. It's going to be tough no matter who becomes prime minister.''

''Without the Alzheimer's remark, it would have been possible that Mr. Aso may become the successor,'' LDP Party Ethics Committee Chairman Takashi Sasagawa said after Sunday's early results became known.

In fact, even though Abe on Monday got the go-ahead from the LDP and its coalition ally, the New Komeito party, to stay in office despite the election loss, looming political gridlock with the opposition camp and the possibility of political realignment will inevitably further weaken his leadership.

''I believe the administration can't survive more than two or three months,'' an LDP lawmaker who does not belong to any intra-party faction said on Sunday night.

On Monday morning, New Komeito leader Akihiro Ota said he supported Abe's remaining in office ''at this stage'' and made the point that the reason was ''because the prime minister expressed his intention to do so.'' The remarks were widely taken as an indication of passivity.

The most urgent task for the embattled Abe is to reshuffle his scandal-plagued Cabinet as well as the party leadership to revitalize the administration, which he said Monday he would do ''at an appropriate time.''

Regarding the reshuffle, which is likely to take place in September, political analyst Watanabe said, ''First, he really needs to have a very good and wise chief of staff who can sense what the general public want and who knows how to manage intra-party dynamics.''

Without a successful revival of his Cabinet, Abe and the LDP may face becoming a lame-duck administration.

''Basically he's a dead man walking,'' said Robert Dujarric, director of Temple University's Institute of Contemporary Japanese Studies in Tokyo. ''Even if he stays as prime minister, no one will take him seriously.''

==Kyodo

Revenge of the middle classes sends Japan’s ruling party to historic defeat

July 30, 2007
Leo Lewis

The Japanese Prime Minister was facing a bleak political future last night after his party suffered a crushing humiliation at the hands of “angry middle-class voters”.

Although Shinzo Abe pledged to battle on, yesterday’s elections to the Upper House dealt a massive blow to his grip on power and his ability to keep Japan on what he described as the “path of reform”.

Calls for his resignation, from the newly emboldened Opposition and from dissenters within his party, are expected to increase. Severe setbacks in elections to the Upper House have forced two recent Prime Ministers from power. A reshuffle of Mr Abe’s ten-month-old Cabinet is expected by the end of next month.

Mr Abe, the youngest Japanese Prime Minister since the war, admitted responsibility for the drubbing suffered by the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP). A number of heavy-weights from the ruling party were ejected from constituencies that they had held for many years. It was, LDP officials told The Times, an election in which Japan’s middle classes had their “moment of revenge” for Mr Abe’s perceived lack of leadership, his weak handling of scandal and a “long-term fatigue” with the LDP.

In rural prefectures, where the “pain before gain” reforms that were instigated by Mr Abe’s charismatic predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi, have hit hardest, the resentment was at its worst. With one seat still undeclared, the LDP managed to win only 37 of 121 contested seats – close to its worst-ever performance at an Upper House election and far below what was predicted in recent opinion polls. The election also dealt a blow to the LDP’s coalition partner, the New Komeito Party, which shed four of its seats.

Ichiro Ozawa, the president of the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) and architect of yesterday’s victory, did not join his party’s celebrations. He was said to be resting after the exertions of the campaign. Yukio Hatoyama, the DPJ secretary-general, said: “I can see very clearly that people are deeply dissatisfied with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s politics. I felt there was a great hope among the people to create a two-party system.”

Among the major casualties were two senior figures – Hidenao Nakagawa and Toranosuke Katayama. Mr Nakagawa, once viewed as a possible prime minister, resigned and said that he would take responsibility for a defeat that ranked among the worst suffered by the LDP. He blamed his party’s defeat on the “strong head-winds” of public animosity stirred by a string of scandals and growing economic disparity between urban and rural Japan. Mr Katayama had been secretary-general of the LDP’s Upper House caucus.

Only 121 seats were elected to the largely ceremonial 242-member Upper House, but the vote represented the first significant electoral challenge that Mr Abe has faced since coming to power. Although he still leads Japan through his large majority in the Lower House, this is the first time that the Upper House has slipped from the LDP’s control since 1956.

Major gains for the DPJ took its previous tally of 81 seats in to 108, making it the largest single party in the Upper House. The LDP was left with a total of just 82 seats.

Under its new majority leadership by the DPJ, the Upper House could become a potent opposition to Mr Abe’s reform agenda. Its leader will be selected from within the DPJ, as will the chairmen of dozens of policy committees that play a critical role in Japanese legislation.

DPJ insiders said last night that the party would use its majority “as a matter of urgency” to table a motion of censure against the Government. That combination of DPJ confidence and muscle-flexing, political analysts said, was likely to plunge Japan into an era of legislative deadlock, with necessary reform likely to be blocked “for the sake of opposition”.

Across the country, electoral upsets revealed a longstanding resentment towards the ruling party. In Okinawa the LDP was punished for its perceived lack of strength on the issue of the realignment of US military bases there. The remote, economically depressed island switched its allegiance to the DPJ in what local voters described as “the only message Tokyo will understand”.

In Tokyo one of the five available seats was won by Ryuhei Kawada, a haemophiliac who contracted HIV in the late 1980s at the age of 10 amid a tainted-blood scandal for which many put the blame on government incompetence.

One of the chief criticisms levelled against Mr Abe – even from within his party – is that his Cabinet was not selected for its competence, but instead was a weak-willed caucus of the Prime Minister’s friends. Since September three of his Cabinet ministers have resigned, one of whom commited suicide. The most recent resignation – of Fumio Kyuma – followed the former Defence Minister’s gaffe concerning the atomic bombing of Nagasaki. Nagasaki yesterday switched its allegiance to the DPJ.

On the island of Shikoku, historically the conservative heartland, all four contested seats were wrested from the ruling party. In Ehime one of the longest-serving veterans of the LDP was ousted by a 32-year-old professional footballer who was described by his own campaigners as “not necessarily the right man for the job”.

Strongest of all, according to Takao Toshikawa, a political analyst, was the belief held by voters that this election was a referendum on the reforms of Mr Koizumi. He stepped down as Prime Minister last year after a five-year battle to destroy the old guard of the LDP and its grassroots support machinery, which included local postmasters and agricultural unions. Though many welcomed his nononsense approach to economic and structural reforms, others believed that they created a deep chasm between rich and poor.

Yoichi Masuzoe, one of the few LDP members who defended his seat last night, said: “There are both bright and shadowy sides to Koizumi’s reforms. Today we saw the dark side.”

Power plays

–– The Japanese parliament is called the Diet and consists of the House of Representatives (the lower house) and the House of Councillors (the upper house)

–– Members of the House of Representatives are elected every four years whereas those of the House of Councillors are elected every six years, with one half of its number elected every three years

–– The House of Representatives is considered more powerful because, in the case of treaties, the budget and the selection of the prime minister, the House of Councillors cannot veto its legislation

–– The House of Representatives can also override an upper house decision to block one of its bills so long as it provides a two-thirds majority in favour of overturning the block

–– The minimum age for a member of the House of Councillors is 30, five years older than the House of Representatives minimum

*Sources: CIA World Factbook, japan-guide.com

Longing for Lionheart

Jul 19th 2007 | TOKYO
From The Economist print edition


Political nostalgia for the Koizumi era, but is it really over?

HE HAS been in office for only ten months, but the fate of Shinzo Abe hangs on upper-house elections on July 29th. Voters appear to think the conservative prime minister, who emphasises “patriotic” education in schools and rewriting the pacifist constitution, is out of touch with their concerns about jobs and welfare; a scandal involving lost records at the pensions agency has caused particular upset. Mr Abe's popularity ratings have plunged. So the elections have become a vote of confidence in the prime minister himself. This week he faced another test: an earthquake that killed ten people and damaged a nuclear plant, giving Mr Abe the chance to sound tough on its owners, who were slow in admitting the leakage.

Photo: Koizumi showing the way

The coalition that the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) leads is almost certain to lose seats, and probably its upper-house majority. If the coalition falls just a few seats short of a majority, Mr Abe might stumble on. A worse defeat might trigger a leadership race within the LDP. Yet the likeliest winner, Taro Aso, the foreign minister, lacks the zeal that voters appear to want for tackling domestic concerns, and has a nationalist agenda very like Mr Abe's. So he would face similar difficulties. A third scenario, says one LDP politician, would be such a humiliating defeat that his party would choose a grand old man, probably Yasuo Fukuda, 71, as a caretaker prime minister. By definition, such a job would be short-lived. So in all these scenarios a period of political uncertainty looms. Some analysts forecast a reversion to the political instability of the 1990s, when Japan got through ten prime ministers in a dozen years and when the redoubtable LDP itself briefly lost power.

If Japan is reverting to type, the argument goes, then the period of Mr Abe's predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi, was an aberration. Mr Koizumi was certainly unusual. A lion-maned maverick, he displayed leadership rare in a Japanese prime minister. He championed reforms and took on the vested interests within his own party, and the system of competing factions for distributing plum posts and other favours. Achievements fell short of the promises, but voters loved it, returning Mr Koizumi and his party in a landslide general election in 2005.

Last year Mr Koizumi stood down early. He said he wanted to have time again to dine well and listen to opera. A backbencher, Mr Koizumi gives no press interviews nor any sign of wanting to return to run the country—though even some enemies in his party now wish he would.

Yet his reformist supporters in the Diet may not share the LDP's general despair. Indeed, some of those known as “Koizumi's children”, who swept into the Diet on Mr Koizumi's reformist coat-tails, think their time might be coming. When he stepped down, Mr Koizumi urged this group not to join any party faction, and about half of the original 80-odd have complied. In June some 30 of them began holding regular biweekly meetings—just as mainstream factions do. They have become, in effect, a non-faction faction, with Mr Koizumi as their unspoken head.

Some modernisers within the LDP, including among Koizumi's children, see little hope of more stable politics and more sensible policymaking in Japan without a split in the LDP. Reformists would part with the party's old dinosaurs and join with like-minded folk in the opposition Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ).

Yet Kuniko Inoguchi, a minister under Mr Koizumi and a leading light in his non-faction, casts doubt on the idea. No new party could match the LDP's organisational powers, she says, and Mr Koizumi knows this better than anyone. Hence the importance of the “revolutionary” non-faction. Market-oriented and internationalist, it will be needed to serve in the post-election regime, and to draw defectors from the DPJ. So, says Mrs Inoguchi, “Mr Koizumi's influence will in time become only more powerful.” If she is right, then Mr Abe, not Lionheart, is the aberration.

PM Abe left alone in the media circle

The approval rating of the Abe cabinet among the media is lower than that seen in the general public. The leading opposition against Abe cabinet is Asahi Shimbun. Ever since the scandal of the NHK fudged documentary in 2001, the newspaper and Abe have been in a cat-and-dog relationship. Abe’s anti-Asahi Shimbun sentiment knows no end. He sued one of the affiliated magazines in the past, and during doorstepping interviews he sometimes says “I don’t know what the reporters from Asahi will think about this,” before making statements. On the other end, Asahi Shimbun constantly bashes Abe in articles.

But that’s not to say that Abe sees no support from the media. Sankei Shimbun and Yomiuri Shimbun, generally known for their conservative views, are considered Abe supporters. Sankei Shimbun only recently reaffirmed a strong pipeline with the cabinet when they scooped the story on the 12-day-extension of the Diet session and the delay for the upper house election until July 29. As for Yomiuri, they have expressed criticism against the Democratic Party on the issues of Constitution revision and consumption tax. However, that is about to change, one insider reports.

“Nabetsune is mad at Abe,” revealed one LDP lawmaker. Nabetsune is the nickname for the president of Yomiuri Shimbun, Tsuneo Watanabe. The anger is apparently caused by Abe’s decision on the assignment for the Japan Fair Trade Commission (JFTC), according to a source. The current chief is Kazuhiko Takeshima, who has a background in the Department of the Treasurey and served as vice Chief Cabinet Secretary during the Koizumi regime.

“Abe recently finalized his decision to keep Takeshima in the position when his term was due next September,” the aforementioned LDP lawmaker explained. “Takeshima speaks out for revising the law of ‘special assignment of newspaper delivery,’ which prohibits different pricing depending on the region and readers. Watanabe wants to keep the law in effect, so naturally he dismisses Takeshima. Abe was fully aware of the fact, but decided to keep Takeshima as the chief of JFTC nonetheless. I heard Watanabe was really furious over the re-assignment.”

“That is not true,” a spokesperson for Yomiuri Shimbun said when Shukan Post contacted them to confirm the rumor. But it is not hard to see that the relationship between Abe and Watanabe turned cold recently.

Ever since the launch of the Abe cabinet last September, Watanabe often dined with Abe. The two met four times during the first three months. However, this year, they only met twice, once in March and the other time in May.

“It is likely that the Yomiuri will start bashing Abe and the LDP when the upper house election is just around the corner,” said the aforementioned LDP lawmaker. The LDP fear that Abe’s decision is likely to turn 10 million Yomiuri Shimbun subscribers against the LDP in the upcoming election.

Abe’s media tactics were a bit sketchy to begin with. He appeared on a radio show hosted by Monta Mino and Terry Ito, which is unheard of as a PM. He was also criticized by his party when he made a solo appearance on NTV, TV Tokyo, and TV Asahi just before the official announcement of the upper house election

Meanwhile he fully uses media to express his opinion, “When there is a report that Abe doesn’t like, then our top officials receive a call from the PM office directly,” said one media insider. His actions raise the question of whether he is suited to being PM of a nation.

“There is a saying that one should never get involved with the police or media,” said political journalist Toichi Suzuki. “Nothing can be achieved and there are no benefits to fighting against them. Especially when it comes to how Abe treats the media, he shows his immaturity.”

“It is unprecedented that only Sankei Shimbun supports the PM,” said Takaaki Hattori, a professor at Rikkyo University. “Perhaps he was influenced by Koizumi, but people can easily detect if he is using the media as his public relations agency. On the other hand, the media are also a problem. They should question Abe to the point where he can no longer find excuses to get away from the questions rather than just reporting his excuses.” (Translated by Toshiya Fujii)

July 18, 2007

Rightists reinvent kamikaze image as patriotic role model

Wednesday, July 18, 2007
By JOSEPH COLEMAN

CHIRAN, Kagoshima Pref. (AP) On April 12, 1945, Lt. Shinichi Uchida faced a terrifying mission: crash his plane into a U.S. warship. But the kamikaze's final letter to his grandparents was full of bravado.

"Now I'll go and get rid of those devils," the 18-year-old wrote before his final flight, vowing to "bring back the neck" of President Franklin Roosevelt. He never returned.

Photo: Visitors view photos of kamikaze pilots who died in attacks on U.S. forces during World War II at the Peace Museum for Kamikaze Pilots in Chiran, Kagoshima Prefecture, last month.

For many, such words are redolent of the militarism that drove Japan to ruin in the war. But for an increasingly bold cadre of conservatives, Uchida's words symbolize something else: just the kind of guts and commitment that Japanese youth need today.

Long a synonym for the waste of war, the suicidal fliers are now being glorified in a film written by Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara, a well-known nationalist and coauthor of the 1989 book "The Japan That Can Say No." And a museum about the kamikaze in the town of Chiran, Kagoshima Prefecture, near the airstrip where Uchida and others took off, gets more than 500,000 visitors a year.

"The worries, sufferings and misgivings of these young people . . . are something we cannot find in today's society," Ishihara said when his movie, "I Go to Die For You," opened this spring.

"That is what makes this portrait of youth poignant and cruel, and yet so exceptionally beautiful," he said.

No one is publicly calling for young Japanese to kill themselves for the nation these days. But the renewed hero-worship of the kamikaze coincides with a general trend in society toward seeing the country's war effort as noble, and mourning the fading of the ethic of self-sacrifice amid today's wealth.

The government has stepped up efforts to expunge accounts of Japanese atrocities from history books and reinstate patriotic instruction in public schools. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, like his popular predecessor, Junichiro Koizumi, is pushing to revise the pacifist Constitution.

The estimated 4,000 kamikaze — or "divine wind" — pilots were named after a legendary typhoon that foiled the Mongol emperor Kublai Khan's invasion of Japan in 1281. Chiran museum officials say as many as 90 percent failed to reach the U.S. warships they were meant to attack.

Despite the pilots' reputation abroad as suicidal fanatics, Japanese hearts have always had a soft spot for the kamikaze. Long celebrated in movies, books and comics, they are seen as innocent young men forced by a desperate military to sacrifice their lives to protect their country.

Ishihara's film plays these tragic-hero sentiments to the hilt, with a strong dose of patriotism: Strapping young pilots proudly sing war songs and down cups of sake before taking off, while townspeople kneel in tearful gratitude as they fly overhead. Girls paint Rising Sun flags with their own blood.

The film is set in Chiran. It was from an Imperial army airfield here that 402 pilots took off, among them Uchida, whose fate remains unknown.

Today's kamikaze boosters deny they are prowar. Indeed, the Ishihara film does not shy away from the futility of the suicide missions, but the nationalist sentiment is clear.

While insisting that the movie's message is antiwar, director Taku Shinjo claimed Japan launched the war in self-defense, and that the decision to send young men on suicide missions was the only option left as Japan started losing the conflict.

"When you get to the roots of the Japanese soul, I think they are embodied in the kamikaze pilots," he said.

While the Japanese have not fired a shot in wartime since 1945, some critics see peril in the new trend.

"It's extremely dangerous to glorify the kamikaze pilots as tragic heroes. The people who glorify them want to connect the prewar period with the present and future Japan," said Atsushi Shirai, a historian who has written about the pilots.

"These views also block critical analysis of the tragedy of the war, what it signified and why it was carried out," he said.

Emiko Ohnuki-Tierney, a University of Wisconsin anthropologist and author of "Kamikaze Diaries: Reflections of Japanese Student Soldiers," said the pilots' private writings and other evidence show that rather than stoic warriors, many were tortured souls, browbeaten and abused into flying to their deaths.

With the dwindling of the wartime generation, which knew the brutal reality of the kamikaze missions, it is becoming easier for nationalists to present the kamikaze as "the model Japanese, who knew how to dedicate themselves and discipline and all of that," she said.

The Peace Museum for Kamikaze Pilots in Chiran goes to great lengths to make the point that the fliers nobly gave their lives for their families. On display are final letters home, photos of cheerful pilots and warplanes such as one dredged from a nearby harbor. A large painting in the lobby shows angels bearing the broken bodies of the pilots to heaven.

Go Kuroki, a 27-year-old hairdresser visiting the museum from the Tokyo area, is one of many, however, for whom the kamikaze are ancient history.

"At that time, I guess that kind of thing had some meaning. But if you think of the times we live in now, I don't think it has any value," he said. Looking around at other visitors, some of them old enough to have served in the war, he added: "Though I can't say that too loudly."

Koike, Gates agree to move ahead on realignment, missile defense

Friday July 13, 9:35 PM

(Kyodo) _ Defense Minister Yuriko Koike and U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates agreed Friday to move ahead on bilateral issues such as the U.S. military realignment in Japan and the joint missile defense scheme as well as an early visit by Koike to the United States.

Koike, who took office last week, told reporters after her first teleconference with Gates that Gates welcomed her planned visit, which she hopes to realize soon after the July 29 House of Councillors election in Japan.

Gates also expressed appreciation to Japan for the two-year extension of a special law authorizing the Air Self-Defense Force deployment to assist the reconstruction of Iraq up to July 2009, a move which was approved by the Diet in June, according to Koike.

In the telephone conversation requested by Gates, the two defense chiefs reaffirmed their governments' intention to proceed with implementing the realignment of U.S. forces in Japan based on a May 2006 Japan-U.S. agreement on the matter, Koike said.

They also agreed to continue cooperation on Japan's deployment of a ballistic missile defense system, to promote information-sharing between the two countries and to maintain good communication between the two sides, she added. [1446]

Lunch with the FT: Akie Abe

By David Pilling
Published: July 13 2007 08:56

A few days after I had lunch with Akie Abe, the near-celebrity wife of Japan’s prime minister attended a private dinner with George and Laura Bush at the White House. The president, enthralled with Japan’s First Lady, gushed: “Thank you for bringing your gracious wife to dinner. The prime minister married very well. I was so impressed by Akie’s compassion and her intelligence.” Addressing the uncomfortable-looking Japanese leader by his first name, he added: “I will tell you, Shinzo, Laura feels like she has a new friend now. And so do I.”

Akki-chan, as Japanese weekly magazines have christened her (the diminutive “chan” is also used for pets and Hello Kitty), has outshone her husband since he became prime minister last September. While Shinzo has struggled to step from the mop-haired shadow cast by Junichiro Koizumi, his flamboyant predecessor, Akie has slipped more easily into the limelight.

Previous Japanese First Ladies may not have walked three paces behind their husband, but none of them exactly hogged centre stage. Akie, by contrast, has been the subject of countless glossy profiles, which portray her as a modern young woman – she was 45 last month – unafraid of expressing her emotions, even passions.

She is known for her devotion to South Korea’s dreamy soap stars, her weakness for a tipple, and her habit of holding her husband’s hand on state occasions; the Japanese equivalent of George giving Laura a French kiss on the White House lawn. (Now erase that thought.) She has talked openly about the couple’s childlessness, and posts a teenage-style blog, Akie Abe’s Smile Talk.

Akie had asked to meet me at a restaurant on the 45th floor of the Ritz-Carlton hotel, the latest palace of luxury to puncture Tokyo’s skyline. I arrive early, inadvertently provoking a whispered discussion among hotel staff worried about protocol: should I await my guest in the bird’s-eye lobby or greet her at ground level? We head downstairs. The attendants are still debating etiquette when Akie herself, oblivious to our little huddle, sweeps past and we clip along after her. On the elevator ride back up she politely ignores me, apparently unaware that I am her FT lunch partner.

Trotting a few paces behind, I gain a First Lady perspective on the world: a blur of bowed heads, nervous smiles, mannered greetings. In the private room, laid with luscious green tatami, we swap cards and sit at a low table. She makes no acknowledgement of our previous misunderstanding. Perhaps it is I who misunderstood.

My first impression is that Akie, dressed in a sober but fashionable grey pinstriped skirt and jacket, is not the easygoing character of repute. She is nervous. She speaks in a small, song-bird voice and bites her lip, her sentences trailing off or ending in self-conscious laughter. Only the three-stringed shamisen music breaks the ensuing silence.

A nervous young waitress arrives in a pink kimono. She lowers her head to the tatami and, hands trembling, offers us hot towels. Just then, Akie’s stomach rumbles loudly. To her credit, Akie acknowledges the gurgling and bursts into laughter. She does not cover her mouth with her hand.

As we try the appetiser, clam in sesame paste – as with many high-class restaurants, there is no choice of menu – I ask how life has changed since her husband became prime minister. “The biggest difference is that we’ve moved to the official residence and that, when I go out, everyone knows me. There are some tense moments when I meet the wives of heads of state. But it’s not a drastic, difficult transition.”

Akie, the daughter of a sweet company magnate, must have known what she was getting into when she accepted an invitation to an omiai – an arranged introduction – with Shinzo Abe, a man whose uncle and grandfather had both been prime minister. Four years after they married, Abe’s father died and Shinzo took over the family seat in distant Yamaguchi prefecture. It was only a matter of time before he became prime minister. “I have been training myself up for this role,” she says.

She is slurping her clear soup now, trying to finish before my next question. I want to know if she is being used to soften the stuffed-shirt image of her husband, who this month is fighting upper house elections that could even dislodge him prematurely from office. “The truth is, he is a really interesting person with a great sense of humour, but the only face he shows in public is very formal,” she says. “If standing beside him softens the image, that is one of the roles I should be playing.”

One problem, she says, is that her husband became prime minister earlier than expected. “He did not have to fight for this position, to struggle for it. He felt he lacked the preparation to be prime minister.”

The waitress has been fluttering, waiting to introduce our next course, a simmered lily root dumpling. Akie suffers rather than relishes the requirement to campaign on her husband’s behalf. “I can’t say it’s something I exactly enjoy. But it’s a bit like a sport. When we win, we reward ourselves with a tasty beer.”

This seems like an excuse to broach the subject of her partiality for alcohol, a contrast to her husband’s near-teetotalism. “Everyone around me knows that I like to drink,” she says. “When we moved to Yamaguchi, I didn’t have relations or friends, so alcohol played a big role in getting me closer to supporters by relaxing the atmosphere. I find alcohol to be an effective tool.”

Warming to the subject, she continues. “I like Japanese sake, but recently I have had the chance to drink really good wine. When I went to China we were served Maotai, very strong alcohol. I was told no matter how much I drank I wouldn’t get a hangover. The weekly magazines wrote: ‘Maotai juppai [10 glasses of Maotai].’ That was an exaggeration.”

We talk a little about her attraction to South Korea, a country also known for its fiery alcohol. How does she view the controversy over so-called “comfort women”, the young women, many Korean, forced to work in Japanese wartime brothels? Her husband had recently got into hot water by suggesting that Japan’s Imperial Army was not directly responsible. “I don’t want to say much about this,” she says, reaching for an answer clearly scripted by advisers. ”Many things went on under the circumstances of war and I feel very sorry for those women who had to become comfort women.”

As we set about the delicacies in our exquisitely arranged two-tiered bento lunch box, I ask whether western stereotypes about subservient Japanese women are true. “When I was working [at an advertising agency] it was common for women to work a few years and then quit as soon as they got married. I didn’t have any particular skills or a career I wanted to pursue. I just wanted to get married and start a happy family.”

Her voice is more lilting and relaxed now. “Nowadays almost every woman goes to college and some hope to continue working even after having a child. But things remain difficult inside companies. Less able men tend to get promoted over women. So some women go to foreign companies or move to foreign countries.” That is a waste of talent, she says. “We have pioneer women in Japanese society, but men’s mindsets have to change. Some of them are still feudalistic.”

Isn’t her husband’s party, which has dominated power for half a century, responsible? Only recently, the prime minister himself stuck by Hakuo Yanagisawa, health minister, who had referred to women as (under-performing) “baby-making machines”.

“I think the analogy that Yanagisawa-san used was a slip,” she says. “His wife is an artist and a university professor. She is independent and has her own opinions. If Yanagisawa-san really thought in that old-fashioned way, he would have made her quit her job and support his election campaign. I think he used the word ‘machine’ by accident.”

The waitress shuffles in again, bringing tea to pour over our rice and sashimi. The lives of Japanese men and women, I say, strike me as being more separate than unequal. The career-track salaryman is expected to show more devotion to his corporate family than to his wife and children. “What do they say?” answers Akie, half-jokingly. “’A good husband is healthy and never at home.’”

Does she share all her husband’s beliefs? “I didn’t have strong ideas to begin with and perhaps for the past 20 years I have been brainwashed,” she jokes. “I am not a politician. I go [to rallies] as a politician’s wife, in support of my husband. In that respect, what I believe is irrelevant.”

Yet she clearly feels at ease with her husband’s mission of restoring pride to a Japan that conservatives feel has for too long festered in wartime guilt. “He has a goal of creating a ‘beautiful Japan’. That can be about the environment, about our treasured Japanese traditions and culture and arts, or about the beautiful spirit of the Japanese people. Since Japan has become an economic power, we have begun to realise what we have lost.”

We are eating dessert now, a delicate cherry blossom tofu in a thick molasses sauce sprinkled with gold leaf. Akie says she sought advice on being a First Lady from Cherie Blair and Laura Bush. But something from Junichiro Koizumi, the bachelor prime minister, also stuck. “He told me: ‘Every day as prime minister is hard, so when he comes home give him a big hug.’”

That would be the most traditional of “stand-by-your-man” sentiments were it not for her impulse to add an explanation. “Perhaps there was no one to give Koizumi-san a hug back then,” she says in nudge-nudge fashion, referring to the former prime minister’s legendary celibacy while in office. “But I think he’s having lots of fun now,” she adds saucily, throwing her head back and exploding into laughter.

David Pilling is the FT’s Tokyo bureau chief

Hinokizaka, Ritz-Carlton, Tokyo

2 x clam in a white sesame paste

2 x clear soup

2 x sashimi: fatty tuna, white fish

2 x simmered lily root dumpling

2 x bento box

2 x rice porridge with sea bream

2 x cherry blossom tofu

2 x green tea

Total: Y30,700 (£125) [1876]

"Somebody call a mechanic!"

Ministry summons broadcasters, calls for 'prudent' election coverage

Jul 12 09:33 AM US/Eastern

TOKYO, July 12 (AP) - (Kyodo)— The Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications summoned officials of major broadcasting companies on Thursday calling on them to be "prudent and accurate" in releasing projections of election results, in a tougher-than-usual action than in previous years.

The action was taken on the first day of official campaigning for the July 29 House of Councillors election.

It follows a move by communication minister Yoshihide Suga last November to order public broadcaster NHK, formally called Japan Broadcasting Corp., to increase its coverage of North Korea's past abductions of Japanese nationals in its international radio service, which is partly funded by the state.

Similar requests for "prudence' had been made since the upper house election in 1995 to NHK as well as radio and television stations mostly in the form of mail. This year, however, officials were summoned and hand-delivered the request because of a surge in false projections about who was elected in the 2005 general election, the ministry said. There were 20 false projections that year from one to two in previous years, it said.

"Given that an error in broadcasting the result of an election can have a major impact on those concerned," the ministry urged the broadcasters to be "prudent and accurate" in delivering projections on air.

Koike conveys to Schieffer wish to visit U.S. to meet Gates

July 11, 2007

Defense Minister Yuriko Koike told U.S. Ambassador to Japan Thomas Schieffer on Wednesday she hopes to visit the United States to meet with U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates at an early opportunity, a ministry official said.

In their talks at the ministry, Koike, who was appointed defense minister last week, and Schieffer agreed to enhance bilateral ties and to continue cooperation in implementing the realignment of U.S. forces in Japan and deploying a ballistic missile defense system.

Koike told Schieffer her ministry will work on creating a system for protecting intelligence to prevent future leakage of sensitive information while touching on a case in which the Japanese police are investigating the leakage of confidential information on the Aegis defense system by some Maritime Self-Defense Force members, the official said.

The information apparently includes data on the communications system also used in major warships and aircraft of the U.S. military as well as performance data on the radar linked to Japan's missile defense system, according to investigative sources.

Koike expressed hope to have the opportunity to talk directly with Gates as soon as possible although she is now busy in the lead-up to the July 29 House of Councillors election, and Schieffer said he will gladly arrange a meeting between the two, the official said.

The defense minister also sought continued cooperation from the United States in the planned procurement from the United States of the Japanese Air Self-Defense Force's next-generation mainstay fighter, codenamed the FX, according to the official.

The ambassador said an important consideration is how to enhance the capabilities of the Japanese and U.S. militaries, not just which aircraft to choose, the official added.

The Bigger Picture Behind the Okinawa "Incident"

Weekly Review #5: July 10, 2001

The Bigger Picture Behind the Okinawa "Incident"

John de Boer (University of Tokyo)

---

Japanese women continue to be exposed to the danger of violence around U.S. bases in Okinawa. Just last week another Japanese girl was raped by a U.S. soldier, this followed the gang raping of a 12-year-old Japanese schoolgirl by three U.S. military personnel in 1995. The most recent heinous crime was reported throughout the world in almost every major newspaper including the Times (July 6th), the Chicago Tribune (July 7th) and the Washington Post (July 4th). Most articles highlighted the implications of this "incident" on the U.S.-Japan security relationship, however, none of them gave any attention to the core issue, namely that of violence against women.

It is no wonder why women stand at the forefront of the anti-base struggle in Japan. In 1995, prior to the raping of the 12-year-old girl, seventy-one women from Okinawa participated in the Beijing Fourth UN World Conference on Women and NGO Forum and appealed against the violent nature of military forces. Their voices were heard and the movement has strengthened since then. In the wake of these crimes, the Japanese government and the U.S. military have been pressured by the media and Japanese society to provide security to the population immediately surrounding U.S. military installations. There is a definite need for the increased protection of citizens against such appalling crimes and the offenders need to be brought to justice. However, I have observed that comments on this incident have remained limited to the discussion of the general security concerns of Okinawans and to some extent focused on the "foreignness" of the perpetrators.

It is true that women are often sexually victimized and abused in areas of military occupation. However, violence against women extends far beyond situations of the military's abuse of power and occurs throughout society. Rather than being a manifestation of exceptional circumstances like the presence of foreign forces, what violence against women tends to reflect, but these articles do not touch upon, is the place that women's sexuality occupies in societies dominated by male privilege.

U.S. military bases in Japan form the cornerstone of Japan's policy of national security, however, Japanese women, and in particular those in Okinawa, seem to be suffering the consequences. This reality cannot be challenged by simply attempting to address the security concerns of those living in the vicinity of military bases, rather, the entire culture of tolerance towards the exploitation of women that prevails in most countries, including Japan, must be systematically attacked.

Articles:

• Clay Chandler, "U.S. Voices Regret Over Japan Incident," Washington Post, July 4, 2001
• Robert Whymant, "Japanese call on US to hand over rape suspect," The Times, July 6, 2001
• Uli Schmetzer, "American sergeant in Japan's custody," Chicago Tribune, July 7, 2001

Japan, just a puppet of America?

Sunday, July 8, 2007

WHAT A STATE WE'RE IN

By JEFF KINGSTON
Client State: Japan in the American Embrace, by Gavan McCormack. New York: Verso Press, 2007, 246 pp., $ 29.95 (paper)

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his predecessor Junichiro Koizumi are usually portrayed as assertive nationalists, but come off here as dutiful and submissive gophers carrying out the Bush administration's agenda. Looking behind the patriotic rhetoric, Gavan McCormack, professor emeritus at Australia National University, argues that the closer embrace of the United States at the opening of the 21st century has widened the gulf between Japan and its neighbors. Japan's "neocons" are isolating Japan and making it more dependent on the U.S. while pretending to be assertive and charting their own destiny.

In trying to become the Great Britain of Asia, Japan is casting off its security constraints and trying to meet U.S. demands, but in doing so is alienating China and both Koreas. Moreover, despite accommodating U.S. demands, it's views are ignored and counsel unsolicited on matters of importance. In this unequal alliance, Japan is treated like a vassal and used as an ATM.

"Client State's" central thesis is that Japan is a puppet state, one that emerged during the U.S. Occupation 1945-52. McCormack points out that the three key issues at that time — the role of the emperor, the role of the military and relations with Asian neighbors — remain "vexed and unresolved."

Like Noam Chomsky and Chalmers Johnson, McCormack challenges the dominant narrative and underlying assumptions, raising serious questions about the nature of the U.S.-Japan relationship that are often buried behind nostrums about "the most important alliance bar none." He writes, "The Koizumi-Abe 'revolution' actually meant the liquidation of some important residual levers of Japanese autonomy, and the acceptance of an even higher level of submission and exploitation within the U.S. global empire."

McCormack explains that, "Identity is the fundamental unresolved question of Japan's modern history." In this context one can better understand the culture war being waged by Abe in imposing patriotic education, airbrushing Japan's wartime history and promoting constitutional revision. By allowing the emperor to remain institutionalized as the symbol of the state in the Constitution, embracing the wartime conservative elite and postponing any reckoning over Japan's shared history with Asia due to the Cold War, Washington has powerfully shaped Japan's identity. These policies keep Japan aloof from the region and impair moves toward regional reconciliation.

Because Japan has been nurtured as a dependent "superstate" with an American-imposed identity, the author believes that "The symbols and rhetoric of nationalism function as empty conceits, while the substance of nation is denied." He adds that "prime ministerial visits to Yasukuni Shrine are a sign not of a reviving nationalism so much as an attempt to compensate for an abandoned one."

"Client State" details the general rightward shift in Japan over the past decade and the spread of violence against critics of this trend. McCormack rightly condemns the shameless silence of then Prime Minister Koizumi and Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe for a full 10 days after the arson attack against Koichi Kato, former Secretary General of the Liberal Democratic Party, in August 2006 following Kato's criticism of visits to Yasukuni. This eloquent silence was "tantamount to consent" and hardly encouraging about the state of democracy in Japan.

What can Japan do? With inequality rising, employment ever less secure, and 15 percent of the population living below the poverty line, neither Koizumi's postal privatization or Abe's emphasis on constitutional revision and patriotic education seem the right prescriptions for what ails the nation. Nor is spending vast sums of money — an estimated $ 26 billion over 10 years — to relocate U.S. bases.

Perhaps the most ominous development from McCormack's perspective is the "2005/06 agreement to the fusion of command and intelligence between Japanese and U.S. forces." This agreement effectively subordinates Japan to U.S. strategic leadership and commits it to collective defense, one of the remaining security taboos that Washington has been eager to eliminate. Richard Armitage, former deputy secretary of State, is portrayed as a bullying proconsul repeatedly intervening to shape and drive Japanese security policy.

If Japan loosens its security ties with the U.S., won't it be a sitting duck in a dangerous neighborhood? On the contrary, McCormack thinks that the alliance is dangerous in the sense that it insulates Japan from the need of making headway on reaching accommodation with its neighbors based on a "return to the understanding of history it briefly reached in the mid-1990s." Without reconciliation, the chances for regional peace and security are limited. McCormack advocates Japan shifting its priority from serving the U.S. to attending to its domestic problems and helping forge an "Asian commonwealth."

This wide-ranging and perceptive book also explores the unhappy triangle of Tokyo, Washington and Okinawa, Japan's hypocrisy in its dealings with North Korea, the implications of Japan's nuclear-energy program and many more hot topics. We are fortunate to have such a lucid and compelling commentary on our very own Truman Show.

Jeff Kingston is Director of Asian Studies at Temple University, Japan campus.

Editorial :: Diet session lacked depth

Saturday, July 7, 2007

With the extended Diet session over, the nation's political focus has shifted to the July 29 Upper House election. Regrettably, the ruling coalition of the Liberal Democratic Party and Komeito resorted to forceful Diet tactics during the extended session, depriving the Diet of chances to discuss important bills in depth.

By force of its majority, the coalition rammed through committee votes on bills to scrap the five-year time limit on pension claims and abolish the Social Insurance Agency and then got both bills enacted. In handling a bill to set up a system for regulating the future employment of retiring national public servants, whose passage was pushed by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, the coalition took the exceptional step of skipping a committee vote and had the Upper House plenary session pass the bill on the basis of a report from the committee chairman.

To give the appearance of resolving the problem of money and politics, which culminated recently with the suicide of agriculture minister Toshikatsu Matsuoka, the coalition passed a bill to revise the Political Funds Control Law. But the bill obliges a politician's fund-management body to attach a receipt to its funds report only when a running expense payment exceeds 50,000 yen.

The coalition's efforts to produce tangible results in the Diet as quickly as possible to tide over the Abe administration during a time of declining popularity preempted detailed discussion by the ruling and opposition camps on important matters, including how to improve the pension system. It is incumbent on both camps to present their policies in a concrete manner to the public during the lead-up to the Upper House election.

In addressing issues such as the gaps between the rich and the poor and between urban and rural areas, pensions and health care, financial reconstruction, etc., they must focus their arguments so that their basic political philosophy becomes clear to the public. They also must present their understanding of Japan's modern history — an important clue for judging their stance on the future issue of constitutional revision.

Koike to work on U.S. ties, urge Okinawa to accept Futemma plan

Wednesday July 4, 9:22 PM
(Kyodo)_New Defense Minister Yuriko Koike said Wednesday she will work on building closer relations between Japan and the United States and urge Okinawa to accept a U.S. military facility relocation plan agreed to by the two governments.

Koike, 54, also said at her inaugural press conference that Japan will consider what it can do to further contribute to the reconstruction of Iraq and Afghanistan based on the changing situations in those countries.

As the first woman to assume the top defense post in a Japanese Cabinet, she said she hopes to listen to the opinions of the female workforce at the Defense Ministry and the Self-Defense Forces to improve their working conditions.

On the request by local governments to slightly modify the central government's plan to relocate the U.S. Marine Corps Futemma Air Station from densely-populated Ginowan to the coastal area of Nago, further north in Okinawa Prefecture, Koike said the scheme has already been agreed to by the Japanese and U.S. governments.

"If we start (making modifications), it will have a bearing on time," Koike said. "It has already been reaffirmed between Japan and the United States that we will steadily implement the realignment plan, so we will seek the local people's understanding while listening to their opinions."

She said she will draw upon her experience as state minister in charge of Okinawa affairs in trying to realize the Futemma relocation as soon as possible as more than 10 years have passed since the initial stalled plan to move the facility's heliport functions to an offshore site in Nago.

The current Futemma relocation plan is part of a final agreement Japan made last year with the United States to realign the U.S. military presence in Japan.

Asked whether Tokyo will respond positively to a reported U.S. request to dispatch SDF troops to assist in the reconstruction of Afghanistan, just as it has done in Iraq, Koike said, "We will be making decisions based on what Japan can do while observing the situation" in the country.

Earlier, in an address to ministry and SDF personnel, Koike called for Japan to take an active part in international peace cooperation activities so as to be able to respond fully to the expectations of the international community.

The House of Representatives lawmaker also said her ministry must create a "multifunctional, flexible and effective defensive power" to protect Japan and deal with new threats such as terrorism and North Korea's missile and nuclear programs.

She said she will work on Japan's ballistic missile defense system and reinforce the management of information at the ministry and the SDF to prevent a recurrence of incidents involving leakage of confidential data.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told reporters at his office that he hopes Koike will make full efforts to ensure the security of Japan and its people based on her personal network and past experience, including her post since September as his special national security adviser.

Abe appointed Koike as defense minister on Tuesday shortly after accepting her predecessor Fumio Kyuma's resignation over his remarks on the U.S. atomic bombings of Japan in World War II that prompted criticism from several quarters.

The swift move was apparently aimed at limiting any adverse impact on Abe's ruling Liberal Democratic Party and its junior coalition partner, the New Komeito party, in the July 29 House of Councillors election.

Her appointment was made formal after an imperial attestation ceremony early Wednesday afternoon.

LDP executives met Wednesday and reaffirmed their intention to stand together in fighting the upper house election and attacking main opposition Democratic Party of Japan President Ichiro Ozawa's basic policies.

But some within the LDP have been critical of the way Abe handled the outcry over Kyuma's remarks, saying it "exposed the prime minister's lack of crisis management skills."

In a speech Saturday, Kyuma said, "I understand the bombings brought the war to its end. I think it was something that couldn't be helped." Many took his words as implying the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945 were justified.

Responding to news about the remarks the same day, Abe said, "I understand he was presenting the thinking of the United States in those days," indicating he did not have a problem with the comments.

Abe also indicated he would not dismiss Kyuma over the remarks until the latter decided Tuesday to step down amid mounting criticism not only from opposition parties but also within the ruling bloc, as well as from atomic-bomb survivors.

Yoshiaki Takagi, the DPJ's Diet affairs chairman, said Abe's handling of the situation was "not self-consistent" as he could not decide to dismiss Kyuma as his appointment last September was reward-oriented in relation to Abe's successful campaign in the LDP presidential election the same month.

Opposition lawmakers also criticized Abe's appointment of Koike, with the Japanese Communist Party's Tadayoshi Ichida saying she had once responded to a newspaper questionnaire that she thought it was acceptable for Japan to consider going nuclear depending on the international situation.

Koike said in Wednesday's news conference that the use of nuclear weapons cannot be tolerated from a humanitarian standpoint and that Japan will take a leading role in seeking nuclear disarmament.

Kyuma is the third member Abe has lost from his 17-member Cabinet since taking office last September, following administrative reform minister Genichiro Sata, who resigned in December over a political funds scandal, and farm minister Toshikatsu Matsuoka, who committed suicide amid a spate of scandals over his political funds.

Koike vows to use security adviser experience in defense chief post

Tuesday July 3, 9:48 PM
(Kyodo) _ Yuriko Koike, who was picked by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to succeed outgoing Defense Minister Fumio Kyuma on Tuesday, vowed to draw on her experience as the premier's national security adviser in taking charge of the nation's defense policies.

"National defense is an important pillar for a state," Koike, 54, told reporters. "There is not a single second to be wasted and I will devote myself to the duty seriously."

Koike, who will be Japan's first female defense chief, said Abe told her to move forward steadfastly with the realignment of the U.S. military presence in Japan as agreed by Tokyo and Washington. The realignment includes relocating a U.S. Marine Corps air station within Okinawa Prefecture and transferring 8,000 Marines to Guam.

"There are various other tasks, including missile defense, so I hope to work on them while consulting with the Defense Ministry and cooperating with other concerned ministries," she said in a hastily arranged press meeting after accepting Abe's request.

Referring to her role as national security adviser in the establishment of the Japanese version of the U.S. National Security Council, Koike said, "I would like to make good use of the network of contacts that I built up with foreign defense officials during that time, as well as my experience as minister in charge of Okinawa and Northern Territories affairs."

When asked to comment on Kyuma's controversial remarks that forced him to step down, Koike said, "I believe that he himself found it most regrettable that the words were taken as justifying the (U.S.) atomic bombings."

"I aim to ensure that Japan continues to assume its leadership role in directing the world toward realizing nuclear disarmament," she added.

Kyuma caused uproar when he said in a speech Saturday, "I understand the bombing brought the war to its end. I think it was something that couldn't be helped."

Koike, a ruling Liberal Democratic Party member serving her fifth term in the House of Representatives, was one of the five special advisers appointed by Abe to beef up the functions of the prime minister's office.

She won her first Cabinet post as environment minister and then doubled as minister in charge of Northern Territories and Okinawa affairs under Abe's predecessor Junichiro Koizumi.

A graduate of the University of Cairo, Koike is fluent in Arabic and well-versed in Middle Eastern affairs.

Her attestation ceremony will be held Wednesday afternoon. [1322]

Minister apologises for A-bomb gaffe

By Mariko Sanchanta in Tokyo
Published: Jul 01, 2007

Japan's defence minister was forced on Sunday to apologise after weekend comments about the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombs outraged survivors and drew criticism from the ruling political bloc ahead of a key election this month.

Fumio Kyuma had said the atomic bombs "could not be helped " as they had brought the second world war to an end and had prevented the Soviet Union from entering the war against Japan.

But on Sunday Mr Kyuma said his comments were misinterpreted and, bowing to pressure from ruling Liberal Democratic party officials, publicly apologised.

"I am sorry that my remarks gave an impression that A-bomb victims were made light of,'' he said at a press conference on Sunday in Shimabara, Nagasaki prefecture, where he is from.

Mr Kyuma said he did not intend to justify the bombings.

His comments could become another political liability for the government of Shinzo Abe, Japan's prime minister, ahead of upper house elections on July 29.

Remarks by Mr Abe's gaffe-prone cabinet officials, coupled with widespread public anger over the government's admission that successive administrations lost 50m pension records, have contributed to a sharp fall in his approval ratings. Support for Mr Abe's cabinet is hovering at about 38 per cent, according to a recent poll in the Yomiuri newspaper, from more than 60 per cent when he assumed office in September.

Mr Abe indicated he was nonplussed by Mr Kyuma's comments. "I understand that [Kyuma] was presenting the thinking of the United States in those days, " the Kyodo news agency quoted the prime minister as saying.

But the remarks drew outrage among survivors, with the Japan Council against the Atomic and Hydrogen Bomb and Nihon Hidankyo, an A-bomb survivors group, urging Mr Kyuma to withdraw the remarks.

Japan's Self Defence Forces were granted ministry status only last year, making the outspoken Mr Kyuma the country's first defence minister since the war. He became embroiled in another political fiasco earlier this year when he said Washington was wrong to invade Iraq and described the US as being "cocky " in its attitude to Okinawa, the island where most US troops are stationed in Japan.

The upper house elections in a few weeks are crucial for Mr Abe, with half of the 242 seats set to be contested.

Under a new law passed on Saturday, the Social Insurance Agency will be dissolved in 2010 and converted into a new corporation handling public pensions.

The staff will not be public servants. In May it came to light that the SIA had not been keeping proper track of people's payments into the public pensions system for years and had lost 50m records.

U.S. wants SDF in Afghanistan

Sunday, July 1, 2007
Kyodo News

James Shinn, who this month will take over as a high-ranking U.S. official on defense in the Asia-Pacific region, has sounded out senior Liberal Democratic Party lawmaker Taku Yamasaki about Japan dispatching the Self-Defense Forces to Afghanistan, sources close to Yamasaki said.

Yamasaki, chairman of the LDP's Research Commission on Security, told Shinn during a meeting Friday in Tokyo that such a dispatch would be difficult, the sources said.

Shinn reportedly asked Yamasaki to step up Japan's physical support in addition to its refueling operations in the Indian Ocean. The U.S. government would like to see Japan contribute in the transportation sector, Shinn was quoted as saying.

He will succeed Richard Lawless as U.S. deputy undersecretary of defense for Asia and Pacific security affairs.

The Maritime Self-Defense Force has been conducting refueling operations for warships from the United States and other coalition forces in the Indian Ocean in support of U.S.-led operations in Afghanistan under the special antiterrorism measures law.

Yamasaki said an additional mission in connection with the Afghanistan operations would be difficult, noting that the special law authorizing the dispatch of MSDF vessels will expire in November, according to the sources.