Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi on Saturday sent a ritual offering to Yasukuni shrine in Tokyo, regarded by Japan's neighbors as a symbol of the country's past militarism, at the start of its three-day autumn festival.
Takaichi, known as a conservative who routinely visited the Shinto shrine before becoming premier a year ago, is unlikely to visit the shrine during the festival, a source close to her said, amid strained relations with China and relatively stable ties with South Korea.
She sent a "masakaki" offering of evergreen twigs to the shrine for the biannual event in her capacity as prime minister, following the practice of her predecessors.
Later Saturday, South Korea's Foreign Ministry issued a statement expressing deep disappointment and regret over Takaichi's offering to the shrine, despite improving bilateral ties fostered by dialogue between the leaders of the two countries.
The Chinese Embassy in Tokyo said Beijing "strongly condemns the negative moves" by Japan regarding the Shinto shrine, claiming that homage paid by the Japanese leader paves the way for the country's "remilitarization."
Meanwhile, economic and fiscal policy minister Minoru Kiuchi paid a visit to the shrine on Saturday. Kiuchi made a similar offering, as did House of Representatives Speaker Eisuke Mori and Senate President Masakazu Sekiguchi.
"I offered my heartfelt condolences and paid homage to the spirits of heroes who gave their precious lives for the nation and renewed my pledge to renounce war," Kiuchi told reporters after the visit.
Takayuki Kobayashi, policy chief of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, also visited the shrine on Saturday. He ran against Takaichi in previous LDP presidential races, but they share the same hawkish views on security and foreign policy.
A cross-party group of Japanese lawmakers plans to visit the shrine on Monday.
The Shinto shrine honors Japanese leaders convicted as war criminals by a post-World War II international tribunal, along with millions of war dead, and has long been a source of diplomatic friction with China and South Korea.
Even while serving as a minister, Takaichi had visited the shrine during its spring and autumn festivals and on Aug. 15, the anniversary of Japan's 1945 surrender in the war, but she has refrained from doing so since becoming prime minister on Oct. 21 last year.
During this year's war-end anniversary, Takaichi bowed twice, clapped twice and bowed once again toward Yasukuni shrine, in an apparent act of Shinto worship from a distance, after arriving at the venue for the government-sponsored memorial ceremony across the road.
The last Yasukuni visit by a sitting Japanese prime minister was in December 2013 by Shinzo Abe, Takaichi's political mentor.
Yasukuni enshrined 14 Class-A war criminals, including wartime Prime Minister Gen. Hideki Tojo who was executed in 1948 for crimes against peace, in 1978.
Past visits to the shrine by Japanese politicians have sparked harsh criticism from neighboring Asian countries. Japan invaded large parts of China before World War II and colonized the Korean Peninsula from 1910 to 1945.
Tensions between Tokyo and Beijing continue after Takaichi said in November last year that an attack on Taiwan, a self-ruled island claimed by China, could prompt Japan's Self-Defense Forces to act in support of the United States.
Meanwhile, Japan and South Korea have improved their ties in recent years following progress on the issue of alleged wartime forced labor, resuming the practice of reciprocal visits between their leaders in 2023.
