Arab News Japan

TOKYO: Japanese radical left-wing students and trade unionists demonstrated in the busy Shinjuku district of Tokyo on Friday to protest the meeting between US President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister KISHIDA Fumio.

The demonstrators marching at night in the streets, shouted slogans and distributed leaflets critical of the summit between the United States and Japan held in Washington on the same day and accused Kishida and Biden of “turning Japan into a country that wages war.” They also demanded “an end to planned revisions of the Japanese Constitution that would allow Japan to wage war.”

Kishida’s visit to the United States is part of a tour of G7 countries who will hold a summit in the Japanese city of Hiroshima in May.

The students denounced what they called “new forms of military imperialism” they say are being promoted by Japan and the United States.

Specifically, they cited the militarization of the Nansei islets, which have become a training ground for American GIs and bases for missile systems to protect against any action by the Chinese military.

Trade unionists have pointed to the increase in the cost of living, including taxes, which they assume will finance the expanding defense budget at the expense of people’s household budgets. They also denounced what they described as “propaganda that seeks to portray China as an aggressor.”

Speakers at the demonstration expressed opposition to the new arrangement between American marines and Japan’s Self-Defense Forces in Okinawa, “where ammunition depots are jointly managed by the American army and the SDF.”