Roughly 100 Japanese lawmakers visited the controversial Yasukuni shrine on Friday at the start of an autumn festival but the most senior ministers looked set to stay away, wary of damaging Tokyo’s already-strained relations with Beijing and Seoul.
The shrine is seen by many across Asia as a symbol of Japan’s early 20th-century militarism because generals convicted as war criminals are honoured there, along with the “souls” of millions of Japanese who gave their lives for their country.
A visit to the shrine in December 2013 by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe sparked anger in China and South Korea, where visits by Japanese prime ministers tend to be seen as a de facto endorsement of the country’s aggressive empire-building.
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