Japan faces storm over 'rewriting' war history

World - Times Online: "A REVISED edition of a controversial Japanese school history book has provoked furious protests from China and South Korea and accusations that Tokyo is whitewashing its militaristic past. Chinese supermarkets even began a boycott of Japanese foods after the book, produced by a right-wing publishing house, was approved by the Japanese Ministry of Education yesterday.

The book removes all mention of the Japanese military’s use of Chinese and Korean women as sex slaves, plays down the death toll of the 1937 Nanjing Massacre in China and simplifies descriptions of Chinese and Korean workers being forcibly shipped to Japan during the Second World War.

The Association of Chinese Retailers called for a boycott of Japanese products, specifically Asahi Beer and the food giant Ajinomoto, because senior advisers to those companies sit on the Japanese Society for Textbook History Reform — a panel with notoriously nationalistic views. Fuso Publishing, which produces the books, accuses mainstream Japanese history textbooks of “self-denigration”.

For decades, Japanese textbooks have caused anger in Asia, with critics saying that they present too uncritical a view of their country’s past. When this book was first approved, in 2001, South Korea recalled its Ambassador for nine days in outrage.

The latest row comes at a time of great tension between Japan and its two neighbours. Seoul is furious over Tokyo’s claim to two tiny islands lying between the countries. Beijing is embroiled in an acrimonious battle with Tokyo over resource rights in the northern Pacific and bitterly opposes Japan’s ambition to win a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. "