From AP, via SFGate.com: Japan sent mixed signals Friday to China, offering a “heartfelt apology” for its World War II aggressions to try to repair tattered ties ” but blunting that message when Japanese lawmakers visited a war shrine critics say glorifies Tokyo’s militaristic past. A Chinese official welcomed the apology but added that “what’s […]

From The Australian: The apology by Japan’s Prime Minister, Junichiro Koizumi, is a sign of the success of Beijing’s campaign of diplomatic intimidation against Tokyo. Japan certainly has plenty to apologise for in relation to World War II. But it has apologised at least 18 times. It has apologised over and over again at prime […]

Thanks to Daniel Lynch for the following comment: If you read the sections quoted below of the Guardian article, you will see that Japanese Foreign Minister Machimura yesterday apologized–again–while also proposing a joint study of China’s and Japan’s history. Koizumi has not visited the Yasukuni Shrine this year, and it would be hard to imagine […]

From AFP, via HindustanTimes.com: Japan’s wartime past haunts its relations with its neighbours 60 years later, with Chinese protesters attacking Japanese interests and urging boycotts of its products and with passionate anti-Japanese sentiment in the two Koreas. Japan occupied the Korean peninsula and much of China up to 1945, during which imperial troops forced thousands […]