An international conference on Japan's wartime crimes on Sunday condemned Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi for insulting the victims of Japanese aggression during World War II by visiting repeatedly the Yasukuni Shrine which honors some Japanese Class A war criminals.

In a statement issued on the second day of a three-day session held in Manila, the Fourth Conference of International Solidarity Council on Redress (CISR) said the Japanese government had reached the point of hiding or even embellishing the war crimes.

The CISR is a non-governmental organization established in 2003 with participants from China, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, South Korea, Japan, New Zealand, the Philippines, the Netherlands and the United States. It is aimed at pressuring the Japanese government to admit Japan's wartime crimes and compensate the victims and survivors of the wars of aggression launched by Japan.

"We feel the need to get together again in Manila to denounce the Japanese government who closed its ears despite all our efforts and demand of countries of the world," said the CISR in a statement.

The CISR said the behavior of Koizumi in paying visits to the Yasukuni Shrine was a typical example of the Japanese government's refusal to recognize war crimes committed by Japanese troops.

"We consider the behavior of the Japanese prime minister and his authorities as very dangerous and a big barrier to world peace. We affirm that Japan has the intention to use Asian countries for its militarization," it said.

The conference, the fourth of its kind, said the CISR would struggle till the day when the issue of Japan's wartime crimes is settled. Shanghai, Seoul and Pyongyang have played host to the previous sessions of the conference respectively.

The conference pointed out that the Japanese government is turning a deaf ear to the victims' voice because it is expecting them -- most of them in their 80s, to die in a few years so that the war past could be forgotten.

The CISR urged Tokyo to bear the legal and moral responsibility to apologize and fulfil its obligation to immediately compensate the victims of the country's past aggression and war crimes.

It also urged Japan to make public all documents and materials concerning the war of aggression, halt their attempts to distort history and Japan's militarist past, and make a pledge that its head of government will not visit the Yasukuni Shrine anymore. Koizumi has visited the notorious Yasukuni Shrine for five consecutive years since he took office in April 2001. The Yasukuni Shrine, established in 1869 under Emperor Meiji, honors 2.5 million Japanese war dead including 14 class-A war criminals responsible for the most atrocious crimes during Japan's war of aggression against its Asian neighbors.

Source: Xinhua