An appeal approved by a cross-party group of 64 Japanese parliamentarians urging Japan to issue former president Lee Teng-hui (李登輝) a visa on humanitarian grounds was submitted to Japanese foreign minister Yohei Kono yesterday.
But when contacted by the Taipei Times, Tokyo-based commentators either refused to comment on the issue saying it was too sensitive or said it was unlikely that Japan would grant Lee a visa because of concerns over China's reaction and Japan's forthcoming election.
Five Japanese parliamentarians met with Kono yesterday morning to hand the appeal to the foreign minister. The appeal said Japan should issue a visa to Lee in view of his intention to receive medical treatment in Japan and because he is now an ordinary Taiwan citizen.
The letter also said issuing visas is a sovereign act and if Japan refused to grant Lee a visa for fear of angering China, the world would challenge Japan's humanitarian values.
In a press conference held by attending Japanese parliamentarians, they criticized the government for lapsing into "a state of anarchy" in dealing with the issue.
And as Kono met with Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori and Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda yesterday to discuss the issue, Mori instructed the foreign ministry to "collect more information" on the matter. But according to the Japanese language daily Asahi Shimbun, the meeting concluded that Japan under Mori would "tend" not to issue Lee a visa to avoid angering Beijing.
According to another Japanese language daily, the Yomiuri Shimbun, five out of 17 Japanese ministers urged the government to allow Lee's visit during an informal meeting of Cabinet members yesterday.
Sources said Kono told reporters that the foreign ministry would further collect related information and make the decision in a cautious manner.
Kono also said that no application for a visa for Lee was received or filed, a comment contradicting earlier statements by his deputy Seishiro Eto and staffers at Japan's de facto embassy in Taipei.
Taiwan has urged Japan to grant the visa on the grounds that Lee needs to make the trip for medical reasons.
Analysts in Japan were largely mum on the issue.
"I don't want to talk about it. This is a very sensitive issue," Ryosei Kokubun, professor of political science at Keio University, told the Taipei Times.
Michael Zielenziger, Tokyo bureau chief of Knight Ridder, argued that tricky China-Japan relations and the recent political fluctuation in Japan's domestic politics could make Lee's visit evaporate.
"Even though your people may want to get it on the top of the agenda, forget about it. Because they are all busy going to meetings to decide whom they want to pick as the prime minister," Zielenziger told the Taipei Times.
"We are having an election next week, and therefore this is not on anybody's agenda as an important issue. The most important issue is always for factions to figure out who they would like to elect as prime minister," Zielenziger said.
In view of Japan's recent frictions with China, triggered by Japan's intention to keep out cheap agricultural goods imported from China as well as a controversy over new Japanese textbooks which reportedly gloss over the nation's wartime atrocities, it's unlikely Tokyo will grant Lee a visa in order to avoid further provoking Beijing, he said.
Beijing reviles Lee, an outspoken critic of China, for trying to break Taiwan out of diplomatic isolation during his 12 years in power, which ended in May 2000. Beijing has warned Japan against allowing Lee to visit.
Lee applied for the visa in order to receive medial treatment from a Japanese doctor for his heart condition.
Lee, 78, underwent an operation in Taipei last November to clear a clogged artery which was attended by the same doctor.
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