Japan PM tells A-bomb defender to keep it shut

Japan’s prime minister sternly reprimanded his defense minister yesterday for his controversial comment backing the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and asked him to curb his tongue in future.

Speaking to reporters, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said he told Defense Minister Fumio Kyuma to “strictly refrain from making remarks that cause misunderstanding.”

“Japan is the only country that suffered an atomic bombing. We need to always consider and stand in the position of the survivors,” Abe said he told Kyuma.

“I understand that the bombing ended the war, and I think that it couldn’t be helped,” Kyuma said last weekend at a Japanese university. Kyuma, a Nagasaki native, said the bombing caused great suffering in the city but said he did not resent the United States because the bombs prevented the Soviet Union from invading and occupying Japan.