Japan Press Weekly

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2013 January 30 - February 5 [POLITICS]

Sticking firmly to Article 9 is the path to peace: Ichida

Japanese Communist Party Secretariat Head Ichida Tadayoshi at a question-and-answer session of the House of Councilors on February 1 insisted that the true path to peace is to firmly stick to Article 9 of the Constitution, neither to exercise the right to collective self-defense nor to revise the article.

Ichida asked Prime Minister Abe Shinzo, “Which country are you representing?” in regard to Abe’s prior remarks in which he indicated his desire to discuss first with U.S. President Obama the feasibility of the use of the right to collective self-defense though prohibited by the Japanese supreme law.

Abe in reply said that he will discuss the matter with his U.S. counterpart and demonstrate the close ties between Japan and the United States both at home and aboard.

Ichida cited the so-called 2012 Armitage Report which regards the ban on the use of the right to collective self-defense as a hindrance to the Japan-U.S. alliance, and said to Abe, “The call for Japan to exercise the right to collective self-defense is not being made by Japanese citizens but by the U.S. government.”

The report also calls on Japan to make changes in constitutional interpretations in order to provide the United States with full-scale military cooperation even in peacetime, Ichida added.

Ichida stated that Japan with its pacifist Constitution “hasn’t taken even one human life in wars or conflicts for the past 67 years following WWII, enabling Japan to hold an honored position in the world.”

Ichida demanded that based on this stance, Japan should contribute to prevention of conflicts and achieving a peaceful world order.

Although the Liberal Democratic Party deletes Clause 2 Article 9 renouncing Japan’s right to belligerency and prohibiting the possession of offensive arms from an LDP-drafted constitution, Abe gave a contradictory response by saying, “I don’t mean to overturn the pacifism and the renunciation of war in the Constitution.”

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Abe, in reply to a Democratic Party lawmaker on the same day, also showed his aspiration to remove Article 9 which bans possession of war capabilities by saying that Japan already has a military.

He said, “The SDF is not defined as a military force in Japan but it is treated as a military under international law. It is necessary to resolve this contradiction to suit the present situation.”