February 8, 2016
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2016 February 3 - 9 [SOCIAL ISSUES]
Civic network launched to oppose ‘merchants of death’ |
The Abe government in April 2014 lifted the ban on arms exports and is now working on the promotion of the sales of weapons abroad in cooperation with the private sector. Already, a Japanese public-private consortium declared a bid for joint development of state-of-the-art submarines with Australia.
The citizens’ network against arms trade claims that the government policy could lead to the creation of Japanese “merchants of death” who look at international disputes as business opportunities.
The network criticizes the military-industrial complex (“merchants of death”) for hampering democratic policymaking and helping to end up victimizing many innocent civilians for the sake of the interests of only a handful of corporations.
Ikeuchi Satoru, professor emeritus of Nagoya University, during the network’s inaugural meeting reported on the situation at Japanese universities where more and more researchers are becoming involved in military-oriented studies.
Ikeuchi said, “Under Abe’s ‘selection and concentration’ scheme, those who are excluded from the ‘selection’ list cannot receive public funding for their research,” and warned, “In order to survive as researchers, they may have no choice but to provide help to the arms industry.” He went on to say, “The situation referred to as a researcher-version of ‘economic conscription’ is actually happening now in the academic field.” Behind these moves is the strong demand for academic cooperation from the largest business lobby, Japan Business Federation (Keidanren), he pointed out.
Past related articles:
> Don’t export submarines to Australia: citizens’ network [December 19, 2015]
> Keidanren calls for further military expansion in expectation of war bills’ enactment [September 17, 2015]
> Gov’t abandons Japan’s arms embargo principle [April 2, 2014]
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