Chinese ambassador denounces Japan's rightwing politicians

China's charge d'affaires to South Korea Chen Hai on Wednesday strongly denounced Japanese rightwing politicians' recent activities of negating history and justifying military aggression, saying these who have done too much wrong will "be nailed to the pillory."

In a signed article carried on South Korean mainstream newspaper the Joongang Daily on Wednesday, Chen said the right-wingers' increasing revolting moves, especially Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's visit to the war-linked Yasukuni Shrine, have severely disturbed the already complicated situation of Northeast Asia.

Abe's visit, which came on the first anniversary of his premiership, has sparked outcries from countries suffering from Japan's war atrocities and around the world. It was the first by a sitting Japanese prime minister since former prime minister Junichiro Koizumi paid homage to the notorious shrine in 2006.

Chen said the Yasukuni shrine, which honors Japan's war dead, including 14 class-A war criminals in World War II, is a symbol of Japan's militarism. China and South Korea, who suffered most from the expansion of Japan's militarism in the past, were reminded of their bitter memories of Japan's past-war crimes by the visit.

"Both China and South Korea love peace and are generous to others. China maintains that we should take history as a mirror and look forward into the future, trying to develop friendly cooperation with Japan and let the war be the past. However, some Japanese right-wingers are still attempting to invalidate the peaceful post-war consensus and challenging the international order, which clearly deserve condemns from the international community," said Chen.

Chen spoke highly of An Jung-geun, a Korean independence fighter assassinating the then Japan's first prime minister Hirobumi Ito in Harbin, northeastern China in 1909 when the Korean Peninsula was a colonial protectorate of Japan, saying he was deeply touched by An's contribution to his motherland.

Chen said Japan's right-wingers called Ahn Jung Geun "criminal" and opposed China and S.Korea's decision of building a monument dedicated to Ahn Jung Geun, which exposes their nature of denying Japan's militarism aggression.

"Where indeed do those rightwing politicians want to lead Japan to? " Chen asked in the article, listing Abe's other behaviors of denying past aggression such as proposing to review Japan's 1995 Murayama statement reflecting on and apologizing for the nation's wartime aggression, along with posing inside a jet plane of Japan' s No.731 unit, which conducted notorious medical research on live humans in China from the 1930s through World War II.

Chen called on all peace-loving nations unite together, urging Japan's rightwing politicians to apology for disregarding justice and human conscience and hurting feelings of their Asian neighbors once suffered from their colonial invasion.

"The bright future for Japan and its relations with neighboring countries can only be achieved when it holds a correct attitude towards history," said Chen.