On Oct. 17 the chief executive of Japan sent a ritual offering to the shrine and then more than 110 dietmen visited it. And the minister of Internal Affairs, the chairman of the National Public Safety Commission and other high-ranking officials of the Cabinet were busy sending ritual offerings and visiting the shrine.

Commenting on this, Rodong Sinmun Monday terms this behavior an open challenge to the justice of history and human conscience and a criminal act of embellishing the crime-woven past history and inciting militarism in Japanese society.

The Japanese reactionaries passively paid visits to the shrine in the past, avoiding the watch of the international community including Asian countries. But they have now become undisguised and emboldened to do so, the commentary notes, and goes on:

What is lashing people into fury is that the Japanese ruling quarters are justifying and shielding their visits to the shrine. Lurking behind this is a sinister aim to instill into the younger generation the "soul" of the militarist maniacs who died in overseas aggression and thus implant into them the awareness that they should take the road of reinvasion by brandishing swords in the future.

The present Japanese ruling forces should lend their ears to the voices of the international community and fulfill their commitments. The prospect of Japan depends on how properly they approach the past history of aggression, how deeply they reflect on it and how honestly they give up their militarist ambition.

If the Japanese reactionaries persist in such act of calling back the departed soul of the militarists as visit to the shrine and go in for militarism, oblivious of this, they will only precipitate their self-destruction.