An advisory council to the Tokyo governor on Monday effectively ended all deliberations over a controversial planned memorial hall dedicated to victims of the U.S. air raids on Tokyo during World War II.
A majority of the 20-member council basically agreed to draft a plan that would greatly expand the space for exhibits on the air raids, metropolitan officials said Monday.
At a news conference, Hiroshi Tashiro of the Liberal Democratic Party, Takayuki Tsuchiya of the Democratic Party of Japan and independent Toshiaki Koga accused members of the council of representing certain political forces such as labor unions. They argued that the process of choosing advisory council members was unclear.
While most members of the council basically agreed to the draft with more emphasis on air raid exhibits, they are still divided over a number of exhibits for the memorial hall. Some members argued that a chronological table to be made for the exhibition should start from the Meiji Era (1868-1912) to explain the international situation surrounding Japan's modernization and wars, while others argued that it should begin with the Manchurian Incident of 1931.
Some members said that current issues, involving those involving the U.S. military bases in Japan, should be mentioned in the exhibition. Others opposed this idea.
The planned Tokyo memorial hall represents one of many similar controversies across the country over how Japan's war in the 1930s and 1940s should be interpreted and remembered in war museums.