Agence France-Presse,
Taiwan's former president Lee Teng-hui made a pilgrimage to a controversial Japanese war shrine early Thursday to mourn his brother in a visit expected to anger Beijing.
Lee, seen by China as a pariah for his efforts to forge a separate identity for Taiwan, denied making a political statement by visiting the Yasukuni war shrine, a longstanding thorn in relations between Japan and China.
“It is an individual, family matter,” the 84-year-old told reporters before heading to the sprawling Shinto shrine in central Tokyo.
“I ask you not to think of this as a political nor a historical matter.”
The shrine honours 2.5 million Japanese war dead including colonial subjects and — most controversially — 14 leading World War II war criminals.
It is viewed by many Chinese and Koreans as a symbol of Japan's militarist past, and also has vehement critics in Taiwan, which China regards as part of its territory awaiting reunification.
Lee's elder brother, who is enshrined at Yasukuni, served in the Japanese navy and died on duty in February 1945 in the Philippines.
Supporters of the shrine and of Lee waved the flags of Japan and Taiwanese independence as he entered the shrine, as several buses of riot police stood guard outside to prevent trouble.
Dressed in a suit and tie, Lee spent nearly 45 minutes in the inner sanctum of the shrine, leaving quietly and not addressing some 100 journalists waiting for him.
China has been repairing ties with Japan but has already lodged a protest over the visit by Lee, whom it branded a “splittist” during his 1988-2000 term in office.
Lee denies he wants Taiwan's outright independence, but while in power he sought to promote a separate identity for the island, a policy that led China to lob missiles near it in 1995 and 1996.
“The goal of Lee Teng-hui's visit to Japan is to push forward Taiwan independence and undermine Sino-Japanese relations,” Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said last week.
Taiwan was a Japanese colony from 1890 to 1945, and Taiwanese tend to be friendlier to Japan in comparison to people in mainland China and the two Koreas.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has said Lee is on a private visit which was not expected to affect relations with China, and Lee himself has said he will not meet any Japanese officials on his trip.
Abe's predecessor Junichiro Koizumi prayed annually at the Yasukuni shrine, infuriating Beijing and Seoul, which refused to hold any summits with him.
Such was their anger that Abe, known for his past support of the shrine, has refused to say since taking office whether he would also go.
The shrine is also controversial among indigenous Taiwanese, who say they suffered under Japanese rule and have lobbied for the Yasukuni authorities to remove the names of their ancestors.
But Ayako Sono, a Japanese novelist and friend of Lee who accompanied him to the shrine, said it was natural for the former president to pray there.
As the remains of Lee's brother are missing, “there is nowhere to go but here” to mourn, Sono said.
“It is a family matter. Different countries have different customs and traditions,” she said.
