Japanese emperor prays for war dead
Japan’s Emperor Akihito bowed deeply atop a Saipan cliff where his countrymen plunged to their deaths to avoid capture by US troops and – for the first time - paid his respects today to the Koreans killed on the tiny Pacific island in a key Second World War battle.
On the first trip by a Japanese monarch to a Second World War battle site overseas, Akihito and Empress Michiko visited several memorials around the sun-drenched island honouring Japanese, Americans and local islanders, as well as Koreans forced to serve in the name of his father, the late Emperor Hirohito.
The two-day royal visit came amid growing anger in China and the Koreas over what many there see as Japan’s failure to make amends for its brutal past.
Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has also stirred up outrage with his visits to a war shrine in Tokyo that is a powerful symbol of Japan’s pre-1945 militarism.
Akihito’s visit to the Korean war dead memorial came after Koreans living in Saipan threatened to stage protests against his trip. The imperial couple were not initially scheduled to pay their respects at the memorial, and some Koreans considered that omission a snub.
A senior palace official refused to say whether those concerns prompted the visit. It was the first time the emperor has paid tribute at a monument specifically dedicated to Koreans killed in the war.
The official said the memorial visit had been approved days before the emperor left Japan, but was kept secret from the media until the last minute because of concerns it might be “compromised”.
Korea was made a Japanese colony in 1910, and 1,000 or so Koreans were taken to the island before the war as labourers.
Not all Koreans on Saipan felt Akihito’s decision to go to the memorial was enough, however.
“Japan has never really apologised,” said Ryan Kim, a local tour guide. “There is more for Japan’s emperor to do than go on tours like this.”
The fall of Saipan was a turning point in the war in the Pacific. As many as 55,000 Japanese troops and civilians died in the three-week Operation Forager, which began on June 15, 1944.
Early today, Akihito offered prayers at Banzai Cliff, which owes its name to the shouts of “banzai” – a cheer wishing long life to the emperor – by Japanese who plunged to their deaths rather than face capture by the American troops.
Before leaving, the royal couple also visited monuments to more than 5,000 Americans, about half of them Marines, and 1,000 or so islanders who were killed on Saipan or nearby islands.
Akihito, 11 years old when the war ended, has been to China and has expressed remorse for the past during visits to Japan by South Korean leaders. But he has never made a trip to offer condolences at a battlefield overseas.
“This time on soil beyond our shores, we will once again mourn and pay tribute to all those who lost their lives in the war and we will remember the difficult path the bereaved families had to follow,” he said in a statement before his arrival for the two-day trip.
About 50,000 people live on Saipan, the capital of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, a US territory. The island is about 1,400 miles south-east of Tokyo.
Saipan has become a popular destination for Japanese tourists, honeymooners and golfers, and the royal couple received a warm welcome.
The invasion of Saipan has been called the D-Day of the Pacific.
Its fall allowed American B-29 bombers to pound Japan’s cities, and the neighbouring island of Tinian was used as the launch point for the planes carrying the atomic weapons dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in early August, 1945.
