When New Komeito backed the Liberal Democratic Party's decision to send the Self-Defense Forces to Iraq earlier this year, members of Soka Gakkai, Japan's largest lay Buddhist organization whose political arm is New Komeito, launched rare opposition to the party's decision.
The members handed a petition bearing about 2,000 signatures to New Komeito's headquarters in January opposing the dispatch, before the ruling coalition agreed to send the core Ground Self-Defense Force troop contingent to Iraq.
"The party is acting against the principle of Soka Gakkai, which strictly opposes war," Yoshihiko Ito, a Soka Gakkai member who organized the movement, said in January.