Steve Quayle News Alerts

June 4, 2002
By Stephen Lunn, Tokyo correspondent

CONCERN is mounting in northeast Asia over the aspirations of high-ranking Japanese government figures to abandon the nation's decades-long ban on nuclear weapons.

Opposition parties yesterday outed Yasuo Fukuda, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's No 2 man, as the person responsible for telling reporters in a briefing on Friday that Japan's principles on nuclear weapons were likely to be altered.

Mr Fukuda, chief cabinet secretary and top government spokesman, last night outed himself, after only yesterday morning continuing to give the impression the comments had been made by someone else and going so far as to say "if such a thing was said, it would instantly destroy the cabinet".

"My comment was not to show the Government's stance but to show there can be a variety of arguments about this issue that would concern the Japanese people," he said last night.

Thirty-five years ago, Japan, the only country ever to have been the subject of a nuclear attack, developed its three non-nuclear principles of "not producing, not possessing and not allowing nuclear weapons into the country".

"The principles are just like the constitution. But in the face of calls to amend the constitution, amendment of the principles is also likely," Mr Fukuda said when he chose to be an "anonymous source". It was possible for Japan to possess nuclear weapons if it "restricts military activity to self-defence".

The comments came after opinion polls moved more in favour of amending Japan's war-renouncing constitution to allow its military to play a greater role in the international community than merely defending Japan's own borders.

The reports have enraged neighbouring nations ever fearful of Japan re-emerging as a military force.

A Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman described the remarks as "shocking". South Korea's opposition Grand National Party said the remarks showed Japan had ambitions to produce nuclear bombs. "Fukuda's remarks, which came as the two countries are co-hosting the World Cup, revealed Japan's true intentions. We see this as a challenge to global peace," it said.

Japanese Communist Party MP Hideo Kijima joined the attack. "It is an unforgivable statement as (Japan is) the only nation to have been attacked by nuclear weapons."

Even Mr Fukuda's Liberal Democratic Party coalition partners expressed concern.

"It causes no problems if the remarks are made by academics or critics, but they should not be made by a top government official," New Komeito Party member and Transport Ministry parliamentary sec retary Yosuke Takagi said.

There is increasing agitation from within the Koizumi Government for the issue of nuclear capability to be considered.

Mr Fukuda's deputy, Shinzo Abe, was recently quoted as saying there was no constitutional impediment to Japan holding a nuclear arsenal. And not all opposition figures in Japan are opposed to the concept. Liberal Party leader Ichiro Ozawa said Japan could easily produce "thousands of nuclear warheads", a warning to the emerging military might of China.

"If (China) gets too inflated, Japanese people will get hysterical. It would be easy for us to produce nuclear warheads – we have plutonium," Mr Ozawa said. "If we get serious, we will never be beaten in terms of military power."

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