Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has sparked fury in China and South Korea by visiting the Yasukuni shrine in Tokyo, which honours Japan's war dead, including convicted war criminals. Mr Abe, who visited the shrine on Thursday, said his visit was intended as an anti-war gesture, but Beijing called it "absolutely unacceptable" and Seoul expressed "regret and anger".
Yasukuni shrine commemorates some 2.5 million Japanese war dead, but also enshrines 14 Class A war criminals, including wartime leader General Hideki Tojo, who was executed in 1948. China and South Korea view the shrine as a symbol of Japan's wartime aggression, particularly during its occupation of parts of China and the Korean peninsula.
The US embassy in Tokyo expressed disappointment, saying Mr Abe's actions would "exacerbate tensions" with Japan's neighbours. This was the first visit to Yasukuni by a serving prime minister since Junichiro Koizumi went in 2006. Mr Abe visited in a private capacity, but Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said it "poses a major political obstacle in the improvement of bilateral relations".
Japan has an unwritten agreement with China from the 1970s that serving leaders would not visit the shrine, and Mr Abe appears to have broken that deal. During his earlier term in office (2006-2007) he said he would not discuss visiting Yasukuni as long as it remained a diplomatic problem.
