Japan PM Shinzo Abe lays wreaths in Hawaii ahead of Pearl Harbor visit
Shinzo Abe does not plan to apologise for the 1941 attack but to "console the souls" of those who died in the war.
Tuesday 27 December 2016 07:07, UK
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has laid wreaths at several cemeteries and memorials in honour of killed US servicemen and women in Hawaii ahead of his trip to Pearl Harbor.
Mr Abe made no public remarks and stood in silence before a wreath of flowers at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, a memorial to people who died while serving in the US Armed Forces.
He bowed his head before wreaths of white flowers and greenery laid at the feet of stone monuments at Makiki Cemetery in Honolulu dedicated to Japanese who settled in Hawaii in the 1800s.
The crowning event of the trip comes later today when Mr Abe and President Barack Obama will visit the site of the Japanese attack 75 years ago that drew the United States into World War Two.
Mr Abe does not plan to apologise for the 1941 attack but to "console the souls" of those who died in the war, his aides said this month.
"We must never repeat the devastation of war," Mr Abe told reporters in Tokyo before departing for Honolulu.
"Together with President Obama, I want to tell the world of this pledge for the future and of the value of reconciliation," added Mr Abe, who has called US-Japan relations "an alliance of hope".
Japanese leaders hope to send a message of unity as well to President-elect Donald Trump, who triggered concerns before his election victory by opposing the US-led Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact.
Mr Abe has tightened ties with Washington during his four years in office, stretching the limits of Japan's pacifist constitution and boosting defence spending.
His visit comes seven months after Mr Obama became the first serving US president to visit Hiroshima, where the US dropped an atomic bomb in the closing days of the war in 1945.