80 years on, scars of war linger between China, Japan

Law & Enforcement

Posted by AI on 2025-08-26 09:03:07 | Last Updated by AI on 2025-08-26 11:37:43

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The date 7 December marks 80 years since the Japanese invasion of China in an offensive that would eventually contribute to half a million Chinese deaths. In the lead-up to the anniversary, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe expressed wishes to visit the site of the 2016 annual bilateral summit in Beijing. The move was met with opposition from the Chinese public and politicians alike, with one politician commenting that Abe was trying to improve his "low popularity base with a wartime shrine card".

Chinese-Japanese relations have been fraught with tension and mistrust since the end of WWII. The Shinto shrine in question, known as the Yasukuni Shrine, honours Japanese war dead, including several Class-A war criminals. Despite Abe's denial of any wrongdoing, his attendance at the shrine has been seen as a deliberate affront to China and Korea, and a denial of Japan's wartime past.

In the 80 years since the war, relations have improved to some extent. However, the two Asian giants have yet to truly address their historical baggage. The conflict between remembering history and promoting amicable relations between the present generations of Chinese and Japanese is an ongoing one. This is especially so when attitudes in Japan towards the war and its victims have changed so little.

According to the Chinese journal Global Times, "It's natural for Japan to want to improve relations with China, but such a wish cannot justify Japan's disregard of history and resistance to facing up to the crimes it committed in the past." While time may heal some wounds, it seems that both countries will have to work together to proactively address the historical wounds that still linger.

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