As Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's government pushes for a controversial new state secrets law, critics warn that the public's right to know will be greatly stifled because the bill, recently approved by the Cabinet, targets leakers of information the state deems critical to defense, diplomacy, terrorism and espionage.
The bill, opposed by much of the media, NGOs and members of the legal profession, has long been sought by not only Abe, but also those in Tokyo and Washington — particularly the Pentagon — who want closer defense ties with Japan but are concerned the current laws on protecting government secrets are too weak.
For much of America's history, a great deal of the government's information classification actions was governed by the military's in-house regulations. But in 1940, after war broke out in Europe, President Franklin D. Roosevelt authorized government officials to protect information pertaining to military installations. Since then, U.S. presidents, through executive orders, have set the federal government's information classification standards.