A Japanese court yesterday ruled that Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi violated the Constitution's rules on religion by going to a Tokyo war shrine that critics say glorifies Japan's militarist past. However, the Osaka High Court rejected the Taiwanese plaintiffs' claims to be compensated over the visits.
The panel said that Koizumi's worshipping at the Yasukuni shrine is a public act and therefore violates the constitutional separation of state and religion, a lawyer for the plaintiffs said.
It was not immediately clear whether the ruling had the force to prevent further visits, but plaintiffs and their supporters called the decision a watershed.
PHOTO: AFP
It was the second time in 18 months a court has ruled such visits unconstitutional.
"This is groundbreaking, a landmark ruling," plaintiffs' lawyer Mitsunori Nakajima said from Osaka. "Most important was the recognition that Koizumi's visits were clearly carried out in a public capacity."
Koizumi and other government officials were disappointed.
"I don't understand why my visits to Yasukuni violate the Constitution," Koizumi said at a parliamentary session following the ruling. "I'm paying my respects to those who died in the war, with the conviction that we must never wage such a war again."
"I visit Yasukuni as a private citizen, and as prime minister, but not in a public capacity," he said.
The court rejected compensation demands of ?10,000 (US$88) by each of the 188 plaintiffs, who included Independent Legislator May Chin (高金素梅) and bereaved families of World War II veterans from Taiwan, many of them enshrined at Yasukuni against the families' wishes, according to court spokesman Masaharu Otani.
"We're not satisfied with today's ruling, though it did take one little step forward," Chin said. "We urge the Japanese government to take three or four steps forward," she said.
"The ruling suggested Japan has started to face the fact that emergence of militarism would endanger the humanity," she said in a statement.
"It is regrettable, however," she continued, that, "Japan has yet to face up to its past `monstrous crimes' which it had committed against Taiwan's Aborigines."
It was the second ruling on a lawsuit concerning the shrine in as many days. On Thursday, the Tokyo High Court turned down a similar case and declared Koizumi's visits were private, but it did not rule on the constitutionality of worshipping at Yasukuni.
Koizumi has gone to the shrine four times since becoming prime minister in April 2001.
"These visits go against Article 20 of the Japanese Constitution, which calls for the separation of the state and religion," the ruling read, according to Nakajima.
The court noted that Koizumi visited the shrine with a government secretary and used a state car, and also criticized him for not clearly denying he was on an official visit.
Additional reporting by staff writer
CREDIT-GRABBER: China said its coast guard rescued the crew of a fishing vessel that caught fire, who were actually rescued by a nearby Taiwanese boat and the CGA Maritime search and rescue operations do not have borders, and China should not use a shipwreck to infringe upon Taiwanese sovereignty, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said yesterday. The coast guard made the statement in response to the China Coast Guard (CCG) saying it saved a Taiwanese fishing boat. The Chuan Yu No. 6 (全漁6號), a fishing vessel registered in Keelung, on Thursday caught fire and sank in waters northeast of Diaoyutai Islands (釣魚台). The vessel left Keelung’s Badouzih Fishing Harbor (八斗子漁港) at 3:35pm on Sunday last week, with seven people on board — a 62-year-old Taiwanese captain surnamed Chang (張) and six
The Legislative Yuan’s Finance Committee yesterday approved proposed amendments to the Amusement Tax Act (娛樂稅法) that would abolish taxes on films, cultural activities and competitive sporting events, retaining the fee only for dance halls and golf courses. The proposed changes would set the maximum tax rate for dance halls and golf courses at 50 and 20 percent respectively, with local governments authorized to suspend the levies. Article 2 of the act says that “amusement tax shall be levied on tickets sold or fees charged by amusement places, facilities or activities” in six categories: “Cinema; professional singing, story-telling, dancing, circus, magic show, acrobatics
Tainan, Taipei and New Taipei City recorded the highest fines nationwide for illegal accommodations in the first quarter of this year, with fines issued in the three cities each exceeding NT$7 million (US$220,639), Tourism Administration data showed. Among them, Taipei had the highest number of illegal short-term rental units, with 410. There were 3,280 legally registered hotels nationwide in the first quarter, down by 14 properties, or 0.43 percent, from a year earlier, likely indicating operators exiting the market, the agency said. However, the number of unregistered properties rose to 1,174, including 314 illegal hotels and 860 illegal short-term rental
RISKY BUSINESS: The ‘incentives’ include initiatives that get suspended for no reason, creating uncertainty and resulting in considerable losses for Taiwanese, the MAC said China’s “incentives” failed to sway sentiment in Taiwan, as willingness to work in China hit a record low of 1.6 percent, a Ministry of Labor survey showed. The Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) also reported that the number of Taiwanese workers in China has nearly halved from a peak of 430,000 in 2012 to an estimated 231,000 in 2024. That marked a new low in the proportion of Taiwanese going abroad to work. The ministry’s annual survey on “Labor Life and Employment Status” includes questions respondents’ willingness to seek employment overseas. Willingness to work in China has steadily declined from
RSS