Beijing – China on Wednesday warned Japan to not propagate misleading versions of its past aggressions and to be wary of wandering onto the dangerous path of militarism.
“The Japanese side should face up to and reflect on history, and draw serious lessons from history,’’ Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said.
Hua’s comments follow two members of Japan’s current cabinet who said separately on Tuesday that they supported using the controversial pre-war Imperial Prescript on Education as a teaching material, in spite of strong protests from opposition parties and the public.
Moreover, according to new education guidelines, Japanese schools should provide students with martial art lessons such as judo, kendo and jukendo (way of the bayonet).
Hua said that Japan’s attempt to resume its wartime approach to education likely led to questions over its taking the old path of war.
These recent moves, Hua said, had caused alarm among peace-loving people in Japan and in the world at large.
“Japanese militarists’ war of aggression produced serious disasters to the Chinese people and people of other Asian countries,” Hua said.
He urged Japan to make a clean break from its past aggressions and not to mislead Japanese people with wrong version of history, so as to prevent leading Japan onto the dangerous path of militarism.