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Mori's remarks revokes militarism
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THE Japanese Government was forced to defuse the latest diplomatic slip of the tongue by gaffe-prone prime minister Yoshiro Mori on Wednesday after he used terminology which could raise China's hackles.
Chief cabinet secretary Yasuo Fukuda insisted that the premier's remarks evoking Japan's militarist, imperialist past while on an official visit to South Africa merely reflected the language of his generation and no offence was intended.
"The prime minister was born before World War II, and received a prewar education. He did not make those comments with any special meaning," the chief cabinet secretary claimed.
He was referring to Mori's remarks during a meeting with a group of Japanese residents in Johannesburg, which were seized on and widely reported in Tokyo by members of the Japanese press who are accompanying Mori on his three-nation African tour.
"I was born in 1937, before the Greater East Asia War, or at the time of the 'Shina' (China) incident," Kyodo News quoted Mori as saying.
The Greater East Asia War was the official Japanese official name at the time for Tokyo's military occupation of Asia and World War II. The term is linked to the "Greater Asia Co-prosperity Sphere", Japan's euphemism for its imperialist aggression.
Japanese current textbooks use the terms "Sino-Japanese War" or "Pacific War" rather than "Shina incident".(SD-Agencies)
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