Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda said A man walks past advertisements for comic books and compact discs on the street in Tokyo. Ties between Japan and South Korea have been strained by a range of feuds, including one over Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's annual visits to a Tokyo shrine for the war dead which Seoul, like China, sees as a symbol of Japan's past militarism. Jun Byung-hun, a spokesman for South Korea's ruling Uri Party, said on Sunday. Two people -- the cartoonist and the chief editor of the comic book -- have been fined 500,000 yen (4,700 dollars) each.
Kishi immediately appealed in the Tokyo High Court. South Korean politicians and media blasted Nakayama, who caused a stir last November by praising history textbooks that played down what he termed "excessive descriptions" of Japanese wartime wrongdoing. Education Minister Nariaki Nakayama was quoted by media over the weekend as saying the term "comfort women," a euphemism for the sex slaves, did not exist during the war and it was good the term had disappeared from school textbooks A comic book which depicts genitalia and sexual acts in two thirds of its content was ruled obscene in a landmark court case which has sparked a debate on freedom of expression in Japan.
Four Japanese basketball players have been sent home from the Asian Games for allegedly paying prostitutes for sex, the Japanese Olympic Committee (JOC) said on Monday. Japan apologized again on Monday for the suffering of women who served as sex slaves for the Japanese military during World War II, a day after comments by a cabinet minister drew an angry reaction in South Korea. Murayama, who as prime minister issued an apology in 1995 for Japan's wartime aggression, said that it was time for Tokyo to finally resolve the issue of the so-called "comfort women" who were drafted into military brothels.
In addition to a territorial row over two tiny islands, many South Koreans feel Japan has not squarely faced its wartime past, including the brutal 1910-1945 rule of the Korean peninsula. The book, consisting of eight short stories, was priced at 920 yen (8.7 dollars) Kishi's defence counsel had argued that an article in Japan's penal code, 日韓高清 which prohibits the sale and distribution of obscene literature, violated the constitution which guarantees freedom of expression. The penal code article itself does not clearly define obscenity but the legal precedent was set by a 1957 Supreme Court ruling over a Japanese translation of D.H.
The Tokyo District Court found Monotori Kishi, 成人影片 a 54-year-old publisher, guilty of distributing obscene printed material and A片 handed him a one-year prison term suspended for three years. The two sides have been unable to set a date for a regular summit meeting between Koizumi and South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun, which they had agreed to hold by the end of June.