New York Times criticizes "inflammatory statements" by Japanese FM
(AP)
Updated: 2006-02-14 11:01

The New York Times criticized Japan's new foreign minister in an editorial for making what it called " inflammatory statements" about Japan's history that were offensive to other Asian countries.

The newspaper on Monday said Foreign Minister Taro Aso was also doing a disservice to the people of Japan where public discourse and school textbooks "have never properly come to terms with the country's responsibility" for its militaristic past that resulted in the sexual enslavement of young Korean women, biological warfare experiments on Chinese prisoners, and the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Chinese civilians in the city of Nanjing in 1937-38.

Aso "has been neither honest nor wise in the inflammatory statements he has been making about Japan's disastrous era of militarism, colonialism and war crimes that culminated in the Second World War," the editorial said.

The Times noted that Aso has stirred up controversy since being named foreign minister in October by suggesting that Japan's emperor visit the Yasukuni Shrine, which honors Japanese war dead, including convicted war criminals, and claiming that Taiwan owes its high educational standards to enlightened Japanese policies during a 50-year occupation.

The editorial added that Aso had riled Tokyo's already difficult relations with Beijing by stating that China's long-term military buildup posed "a considerable threat" to Japan.

"Mr. Aso's sense of diplomacy is as odd as his sense of history," the editorial concluded.

Earlier this month, Aso also came under criticism in an editorial in Japan's Asahi Shimbum newspaper which said his remarks on the Yasukuni Shrine "have raised serious doubts whether he is aware of the huge responsibilities and weight of his job as Japan's top diplomat."