Abe seeks to break with Japan's postwar past By Chie Matsumoto

Deutsche Presse Agentur
Published: Wednesday September 20, 2006

Tokyo- Shinzo Abe was poised to lead a more independent Japan with a nationalist slant as the successor of outgoing Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi. He has said he seeks to rewrite Japan's pacifist constitution, supports Koizumi's visits to the Yasukuni war shrine and has suggested granting its Self-Defence Forces the right to pre-emptive strikes.

The chief cabinet secretary, who turns 52 on Thursday, is the offspring of a political dynasty. His father was foreign minister Shintaro Abe and his grandfather was postwar prime minister Nobusuke Kishi, who was a large influence on prime minister-designate's conservatism.

One of Abe's key goals is Kishi's unfulfilled dream - to change the constitutional limits put on Japan's military that allow it only to act in self-defence.

To free Japan from its postwar mentality is also Abe's aim as written in his recently published best-seller, Toward the Beautiful Nation.

"I can develop a forum where Japan can comfortably assert its stance rather than playing in the field established by other nations," said the politician who was headed to becoming Japan's first prime minister born after World War II.

He is also poised to become its youngest after being elected the new leader of Japan's ruling Liberal Democratic Party Wednesday. The only hurdle between him and the premiership now is a parliamentary vote Tuesday that he is all but certain to win since his party has a majority in parliament.

Abe is widely popular despite being a relative newcomer to Japan's political scene. He first entered politics 13 years ago, and the conservative hardliner held his first cabinet post last year.

A graduate of Tokyo's Seikei University in 1977, Abe studied politics at the University of Southern California. He worked at Kobe Steel before entering political life as an aide to his father, who was foreign minister in 1982.

After his father's death from cancer, Abe ran for parliament and was elected in 1993.

Eager to shed the perception by some that he is the spoiled son of a rich politician, Abe has taken strong stances and proved his political toughness against North Korea over its abductions of Japanese citizens.

Exhibiting his nationalist roots, Abe has co-founded a group that argues that Japan's history textbooks were too self-critical and cast doubt on whether Japan's military had really forced women into sexual slavery in Asia during World War II.

This conservative viewpoint and Abe's support of Koizumi's visits to the Yakusuni war shrine could further aggravate relations with Japan's Asian neighbours who suffered under Japan's wartime occupation, particularly China and South Korea.

The two Asian nations have refused to meet with Koizumi in protest of his visits to Yasukuni.

Abe has taken a hard line against North Korea, too, over its weapons programmes. He supported a series of sanctions against the communist state after it launched seven ballistic missiles into the Sea of Japan in July.

He also won support from the West and eventually from China to agree to adopt a UN resolution less than two weeks later that demanded that Pyongyang halt further missile testing.

The Japanese government will change hands on Tuesday, but experts questioned whether Abe can maintain the momentum of his popularity.

Abe is now faced with putting Koizumi's political reforms into practice. In his more than five-year tenure, Koizumi saw Japan rise from an economic recession, asserted its role in the international community and strengthened ties with the United States.

On the other hand, Abe is also to inherit problems from the previous leader. Under Koizumi's push to privatize the postal service, for instance, his party lost some veteran members who rebelled against the policy and were replaced with political newcomers.

Abe's immediate challenge is whether he can secure sufficient members for his party in local elections to win a majority in the elections scheduled next summer for parliament's House of Councillors - all of which he is supposed to accomplish amid worries about his lack of political experience.

© 2006 DPA - Deutsche Presse-Agenteur