Prime Minister Fumio Kishida sent a ritual offering Tuesday for the fall festival at Tokyo's war-linked Yasukuni shrine, seen by some of Japan's Asian neighbors as a symbol of the country's past militarism.
Kishida sent the "masakaki" offering on the first day of the festival, but he is unlikely to make an in-person visit during the three-day event, having refrained from doing so since taking office in October 2021, people close to him said.
Yoshitaka Shindo, minister in charge of economic revitalization, and economic security minister Sanae Takaichi, known for her hawkish views on foreign affairs, visited the shrine Tuesday morning.
Shindo, who assumed his current post in a Cabinet reshuffle in September, told reporters, "I paid my respects to the spirits of those who carried out important duties for the country and their families."
Regarding Kishida's offering, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said Beijing "firmly opposes Japan's negative moves" and has lodged "stern representations" with Tokyo.
China urges that Japan honors its "pledge of facing up to and reflecting on its own history of aggression and make a clean break with militarism," to earn the trust of its Asian neighbors and the international community, she said.
South Korea expressed its "deep disappointment and regret" over Kishida's offering and the visits by ministers, with Foreign Ministry spokesman Lim Soo Suk saying Yasukuni "enshrines war criminals and glorifies Japan's past aggression."
"We urge Japan's leaders to squarely face history and show their humble reflection and genuine repentance for the past through their actions," Lim said.
The festival comes as Sino-Japanese ties have become strained due to the release into the sea of treated radioactive water from the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant since August, while bilateral relations between Tokyo and Seoul have rapidly improved.
Yasukuni has been a source of diplomatic friction with China and South Korea as Japan's wartime leaders, convicted as war criminals in a post-World War II international tribunal, are among the more than 2.4 million war dead honored at the shrine.
Past visits to Yasukuni by Japanese prime ministers, including assassinated former leader Shinzo Abe, known as a hawkish politician, and lawmakers have drawn a backlash from China and South Korea, where memories of Japan's wartime actions run deep.
Japan ruled the Korean Peninsula from 1910 to 1945 and occupied a vast swath of China.
On Monday, Economy, Trade and Industry Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura, who belongs to a conservative faction formerly led by Abe in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, visited Yasukuni ahead of the latest festival.
To avoid angering Beijing and Seoul, recent prime ministers have sent offerings to the shrine at the time of its festivals in the spring and fall as well as the anniversary of Japan's surrender in the war on Aug. 15, 1945.
In 1978, Yasukuni added 14 Class-A war criminals, including wartime Prime Minister Gen. Hideki Tojo, to the enshrined deities, stirring controversy at home and abroad. Tojo was executed by hanging for crimes against peace.
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