Risking new rows with its neighbors, Japan yesterday authorized for school use a nationalist-written history textbook which China and South Korea accuse of glossing over Japan's wartime atrocities.
The education ministry said it approved the controversial book as one of eight that can be used to instruct students aged 13 to 15 from April next year. The book is an updated version of the textbook which triggered formal protests from Beijing and Seoul upon its release in 2001.
Approval came days after mobs attacked Japanese businesses in China, denouncing Japan for seeking a permanent UN Security Council seat while failing to show regret for its occupation of the country before and during World War II.
South Korea told Japan last month that it disapproved of the textbook. Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda said yesterday that Japan was ready to discuss the issue with Seoul. The two countries' foreign ministers are to meet tomorrow in Pakistan on the sidelines of an Asian regional meeting.
In approving the revised textbook, the ministry demanded 124 changes to tone down some of the right-wing assertions, but other deeply controversial points remain.
The book avoids the word "invasion" when it refers to Japan's military occupation of other Asian countries in the first half of the 20th century. It teaches students that "no single country steered completely clear of killing or abusing unarmed people," while admitting the Japanese military was among those that committed "unfair murder and abuse" of people of enemy countries.
The textbook was adopted in 2002 by less than 0.1 percent of schools, all of them for children with disabilities, although it became an instant bestseller when it went on sale at general bookstores in mid-2001.
Meanwhile, Hosoda said, a boycott of Japanese goods advocated by a group of Chinese retailers would hurt China's economy and would probably not be tolerated by Beijing. The China Chain Store and Franchise Association has called for a boycott of Japanese goods as a protest against Japanese textbooks which it says misrepresent Japan's role in World War II.
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