Visits To Yasukuni Shrine
On August 15, 2012 Hata, along with National Safety Commissioner Jin Matsubara became the first cabinet ministers of the DPJ to openly visit the controversial Yasukuni Shrine on August 15 since the party came to power in 2009. They made their visits to commemorate the 67th anniversary of the end of World War II despite requests from South Korea to refrain from doing so, and despite Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda requesting his cabinet not to do so.
Read more about this topic: Yuichiro Hata
Famous quotes containing the words visits and/or shrine:
“Dr. Craigle: A good man, completely reliable. Not given to overcharging and stringing visits out, the way some do.
Phil Green: Do you mean the way some doctors do or do you mean the way some Jewish doctors do?
Dr. Craigle: I suppose you’re right. I suppose some of us do it, too. Not just the Chosen People.”
—Moss Hart (1904–1961)
“The United Nations cannot do anything, and never could; it is not an animate entity or agent. It is a place, a stage, a forum and a shrine ... a place to which powerful people can repair when they are fearful about the course on which their own rhetoric seems to be propelling them.”
—Conor Cruise O’Brien (b. 1917)