Article Posted on : - Jul 03, 2014

A file photo.

TOKYO (AFP): Japan's prime minister has likened the relaxation of strict rules on the country's military to the seismic shift of the Meiji Restoration -- a moment widely understood as the birth of the modern nation -- a report said.

The comments emerged after Shinzo Abe proclaimed Japan's powerful military had the right to go into battle in defence of allies, so-called "collective self-defence", in a highly contentious change in the nation's pacifist stance.

The conservative premier, who has long cherished a desire to beef up Japan's armed forces, faced massive opposition from a population deeply wedded to the principle of pacifism that underpins its identity.

He had sought in public to play down the shift, which he said was a necessary update to better protect Japan in a region dominated by an increasingly assertive China and worried by an erratic North Korea, which Wednesday lobbed rockets into the Sea of Japan (East Sea).

But talking to senior officials of his Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) he said "collective self-defence is as significant as the Meiji Restoration", Jiji Press reported, without citing sources.

The 1868 Meiji Restoration marks the beginning of modern Japan, when it cast off more than two centuries of feudalism under samurai warriors in which foreign travel was banned and the ports were closed to outsiders.

It saw the emperor return to pre-eminence at the pinnacle of the state and heralded the coming of rapid industrialisation that would lead to the ultimately-thwarted imperial ambitions and the disaster of World War II.

Asked by AFP to expand on the prime minister's comparison, deputy chief cabinet secretary Katsunobu Kato demurred, but did not deny it had been made.

"I decline to comment on it... as the comment was not made in a public arena nor was recorded," he said.

"However the prime minister has said on various occasions, including at the press conference, that we protect people's lives and peace whatever happens," Kato added.

China's state-run media launched a broadside against the relaxation of rules, casting it as a threat to Asian security.

"The Japanese government is eager to break through the post-war system," wrote the ruling Communist Party's flagship People's Daily newspaper in an editorial penned under the name "Zhong Sheng", a homophone for "Voice of China".

It called the Abe government's move "a dangerous signal, as well as a wake-up call".