Singapore Deputy Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong urged Japan on Sunday to put its wartime history behind it and begin contributing to the overall prosperity of East Asia, Japanese and Singaporean officials said.
In talks with Taku Yamasaki, secretary general of the governing Liberal Democratic Party, Lee was quoted as saying that Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's Aug. 13 visit to Tokyo's Yasukuni Shrine, where Class A war criminals are among those honored, has upset other Asian countries.
Lee said the statement that Koizumi issued prior to his visit to the Shinto shrine "was a helpful official acknowledgment that Japan had undertaken a war of aggression in the Second World War, and that the Japanese government felt deep regret for this," according to a Singapore Foreign Ministry spokesman.
But he also pointed out that Japan has not succeeded in coming to terms with its role in the war, and because of the status and history of the shrine, Koizumi's visit "has been seen by some as endorsing Japan's actions in the war," the spokesman said.