Many Diet members contend that it is important to show proper respect for the national flag and national anthem.

Speaking to a local assembly in Shizuoka city, Education Minister Nariaki Nakayama accused the country's mostly left-leaning teaching establishment of focusing too much on Japan's war guilt in classrooms, saying it "has overemphasized that Japan is a bad country.

"We need to educate children so that they can live to be proud and confident as Japanese," he said as he backed proposed revisions to Japan's Basic Education Law for a more nationalist curriculum.

Teachers have strongly opposed efforts to give the national anthem and flag, which remain powerful symbols of Japan's wartime military, a more prominent role in schools.

"To teach love for one's country, it's important to express proper respect for the national flag and national anthem," Nakayama countered June 11.

His comments could further infuriate China and South Korea, who have long accused Japan of whitewashing wartime atrocities in its school textbooks.

The Japan Times Weekly: June 18, 2005
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