The government panel on Ainu policies held its first meeting Aug. 11, aiming to look into the lives and discrimination the indigenous group faces, and come up with remedial action.

The group, headed by Koji Sato, a professor emeritus of constitutional law at Kyoto University, will meet about once a month and submit proposals to the chief Cabinet secretary by next summer.

"There needs to be broad public understanding and cooperation," Sato said. "The most important starting point is to have the public accurately understand the history and grasp the situation of the Ainu."

The panel's creation followed the Diet's passage in June of a resolution to officially recognize, for the first time, the Ainu as an indigenous people of Japan.