The Liberal Democratic Party-Komeito ruling coalition on Friday submitted a potentially game-changing bill to the Upper House aimed at eliminating hate speech.

Although the legislation may herald a break from Japan's traditionally lukewarm attitude toward curbing racism and hate speech, it imposes no penalties on violators, perhaps to avoid battles over free speech.

Before submission, the bill was approved by the LDP's general council at noon, said lawmaker Katsuei Hirasawa, who headed the LDP-Komeito task force charged with drawing up the bill.

With the ruling coalition commanding more than two-thirds of the 475-member Lower House and a majority in the 242-member Upper House, the bill, also endorsed by Komeito, stands a high chance of passage in the current session.

If enacted, the lawmaker-initiated legislation will be significant in that it makes the unprecedented statement that "unjust discriminatory remarks" directed at foreign nationals are "unforgivable," while putting responsibility on government and local municipalities to take measures to "eliminate" such language.

Subject to the legislation is speech "instigating an exclusion of foreign residents out of their society" through comments "publicly threatening to hurt their lives, bodies, freedom, reputation and properties."

However, the bill does not spell out specific anti-hate speech measures to be taken by the government or penalties for violators.

Central and local governments would be duty-bound to launch a consultation system for foreigners and ramp up efforts to educate residents on the importance of eradicating xenophobic speech.

Although philosophical at best, the LDP-Komeito bill is "a step forward" and represents a breakthrough in Japan's long-stalled effort to check hate speech, said Hiroshi Tanaka, a professor emeritus of sociology at Hitotsubashi University in Tokyo.

Despite Japan's 1995 accession to the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, the nation has so far adopted no domestic law to ban racism and hate speech. If enacted, the law will be the first of its kind.

The legislation will likely be deliberated in coordination with a similar bill submitted by lawmakers of the now-defunct Democratic Party of Japan and Social Democratic Party last year. Although it similarly fell short of penalizing violators, the DPJ-SDP bill used stronger language and said it would "prohibit" all forms of racial discrimination.

The opposition bill was also more concrete in that it mandated the establishment within the Cabinet Office of a committee for probing allegations of hate speech and for instructing government officials. Tanaka said similar measures should be incorporated into the LDP-Komeito bill.

Amid deteriorating bilateral relations, a litany of xenophobic rallies have come to a head in ethnic Korean neighborhoods like Shin-Okubo in Tokyo and Tsuruhashi in Osaka in recent years.

Marchers typically brandish banners and chant slogans denigrating Koreans, with some even going so far as to demand that they be "massacred," a recent Justice Ministry survey found.

The same survey concluded that, although less frequent than before, ultra-conservative citizens' groups responsible for these demonstrations still organize similar events on a regular basis and the problem is showing no signs of subsiding.

"Such a situation is not desirable in terms of Japan's standing in the international community," the preface of the bill said.