The Japanese Communist Party is the oldest political party in the country. It’s the largest nonruling Communist party in the world. It’s harshly critical of China. And the Japanese authorities list it, along with the Islamic State group and North Korea, as a threat to national security.
To many in Japan, that comparison seems exaggerated. The JCP, which long ago abandoned Marx and Lenin and never really had time for Stalin or Mao, is about as radical as a beige cardigan: anti-war, pro-democracy, pro-economic equality.
But that hasn’t stopped it from becoming a primary target of Japan’s dominant political force, the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), before parliamentary elections Sunday that will help set the country’s path out of the pandemic.