Haruki Murakami, the Japanese author perennially pegged as a contender for the Nobel literature prize, has called for a fight…
TOKYO —
Haruki Murakami, the Japanese author perennially pegged as a contender for the Nobel literature prize, has called for a fight against historical revisionism in a rare interview with Japanese media published on Sunday.
His comments came after a successful Japanese hotel chain operator triggered an angry backlash from China earlier this year for his book claiming the 1937 Nanjing massacre committed by Japanese troops a “fabrication”.
Critics say that revisionists have grown bolder under nationalist Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who says Japan must shake off past constraints, including altering its war-renouncing constitution imposed by American occupiers after World War II.
Toshio Motoya not only penned a book calling the Nanjing massacre a lie but proudly displays it in guest rooms of his nationwide chain of APA hotels.
China says 300,000 people died in a six-week spree of killing, rape and destruction by the Japanese military that began in December 1937.
