Japan Press Weekly

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2021 August 11 - 17 TOP3 [PEACE]

JCP Koike renews resolution to defend Article 9 on End of WWII Day

August 15 is the Day marking the end of World War II. More than 20 million people in the Asia-Pacific region and more than three million people in Japan were killed in the war.

Japanese Communist Party Secretariat Head Koike Akira on this day expressed his determination to make an all-out effort to defend the war-renouncing Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution which the people of Japan achieved through their bitter wartime experience, and to help build a truly peaceful Japan and world. At the same time, he strongly protested the visit to the Yasukuni Shrine by Cabinet Ministers on the day marking the end of the Pacific War.

This year' End of Pacific War Day took place under the prolonged pandemic situation while the global call for reflection on colonialism is growing as shown in worldwide campaigns against ethnic discrimination, widening social and economic disparities, and increasing poverty.

The Suga government, however, never reflects on Japan's past colonial rule. It is, instead, using the ongoing COVID-19 crisis as an excuse to revise the Constitution by claiming the need to include a "state emergency provision" in the Constitution. Under the pretext of a Taiwan emergency due to the increased tensions between the United States and China, the Suga government is also seeking to implement the national security-related legislation which allows Japan to exercise the right to collective self-defense with a view to hollowing out Article 9 of the Constitution. The Suga government is unwilling to critically reflect on the lessons learned from history.