Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi did not visit Yasukuni Shrine on the 15th, which is Korea's Liberation Day and Japan's defeat day, and instead offered a tamagushi monetary offering in her capacity as president of the Liberal Democratic Party.
However, two Ministers, including Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi, visited Yasukuni Shrine on the defeat day for the seventh straight year as sitting Cabinet members. Senior executives of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party also made an unusual group visit.
According to NHK and the Asahi Shimbun, Takaichi on the morning of the day offered a tamagushi monetary offering at Yasukuni Shrine at her own expense. It was reported as an offering made in her capacity as LDP president, not as prime minister.
Before taking office, Takaichi regularly visited Yasukuni every Aug. 15, but this time, marking her first defeat day as prime minister, she was seen as holding off a visit in consideration of backlash from neighboring countries such as Korea and China.
Takaichi plans to visit the Tokyo Metropolitan Memorial Cemetery for the War Dead on the morning of the day to lay flowers.
Koizumi, the defense minister, made a surprise visit to Yasukuni Shrine at around 7 a.m. on the morning of the day.
A sitting defense minister visiting Yasukuni Shrine on the defeat day is the first time in two years since 2024, when then-Defense Minister Minoru Gihara did so.
Koizumi, the defense minister, also visited Yasukuni Shrine on the defeat day last year, when he was the minister of agriculture, forestry and fisheries.
In addition to Koizumi, Defense Minister, Okinawa and Northern Territories Affairs Minister Hitoshi Gikawada also visited Yasukuni Shrine on the morning of the day and offered a monetary offering.
In addition, LDP Secretary-General Shunichi Suzuki, General Council Chair Haruko Arimura, and Election Strategy Committee Chair Yasutoshi Nishimura made a group visit to Yasukuni Shrine on the morning of the day following Defense Minister Koizumi.
Senior executives of the LDP making a group visit to Yasukuni on the defeat day is considered unusual.
Members of the nonpartisan parliamentary group "Lawmakers' group for visiting Yasukuni Shrine together," as well as the LDP "Conservative Unity Group," will also visit Yasukuni Shrine on the morning of the day.
Yasukuni Shrine is a facility that commemorates about 2,466,000 people who died in civil wars around the Meiji Restoration and in the many wars waged by imperial Japan; A-class war criminals from the Pacific War, including former Prime Minister Hideki Tojo who was executed under the International Military Tribunal for the Far East (Tokyo Trials), are also enshrined there, and it is regarded as a symbol of Japanese militarism.