Japan Press Weekly

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2016 November 23 - 29 [POLITICS]

JCP Koike: extension of Diet session in order to bulldoze though adverse bills is unacceptable

The ruling Liberal Democratic and Komei parties on November 28 unilaterally decided to extend the current extraordinary session of the Diet, which was scheduled to be closed on November 30, for another two weeks.

Later on the same day, Japanese Communist Party Secretariat Head Koike Akira held a press conference in the Diet building and said, “It’s absolutely absurd to prolong the Diet session. The current session should go into recess as scheduled without enacting the adverse bills, including proposals for the TPP ratification and cuts in pension benefits.”

Pointing out that the public pension program is a key to building up public trust in the government, Koike said that the steamroller voting in favor of the pension cut bill will destroy the backbone of the pension system.

Regarding the TPP ratification bill, Koike said that the enactment of the bill is tantamount to declaring that in any trade talks, Japan is ready to make a compromise at the same level agreed to in the TPP. Koike stressed, “In future bilateral negotiations as well as in TPP renegotiations, the United States will probably push Japan to accept further deregulation,” and demanded the abolition of the bill.

Past related articles:
> JCP stands against extension of current Diet session: JCP Koike [November 22, 2016]
> Abe gov’t still sticks to pushing for TPP [November11, 2016]