China yesterday lodged a strong protest over Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's visit to the Yasukuni Shrine a symbol of Japanese militarism and expressed strong indignation.

The Foreign Ministry issued a firmly-worded statement yesterday condemning the move.

Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing urgently summoned Japanese Ambassador to China Koreshige Anami to express condemnation.

Despite the opposition from China and other Asian countries and their peoples, Koizumi once again visited Yasukuni Shrine, where 14 Class A war criminals of World War II are honored, the statement said.

Such a move "randomly hurt the feelings and dignity" of the victimized countries and their peoples during the war and "seriously undermined Sino-Japanese relations", it said.

It was Koizumi's fifth visit to the shrine since he took office in April 2001. Despite the Chinese side's sincerity and efforts at safeguarding Sino-Japanese relations, Koizumi, "obstinately sticks to a wrong and dangerous course, which cannot but outrage us," it said.

Koizumi "must shoulder all responsibilities for the severe political consequences resulting from his wrongdoing," it said.

"The will of the people cannot be insulted," the statement quoted a Chinese proverb, adding that "anyone who goes against the trends of the times will let down both ancestors and descendants, and will eventually 'lift a rock only to drop it on his own feet'," it said.

Also yesterday, Chinese Ambassador to Japan Wang Yi sternly criticized Koizumi for his shrine visit.

The Chinese government firmly opposes such visits at any time and in any form, he said.

Koizumi must "take the historic responsibility for undermining the bilateral relationship," he said.

He called the visit a "serious provocation to the Chinese people," pointing out that it came just hours after China's second manned space mission returned to Earth.

In Beijing, a dozen demonstrators, waving banners, handed over a petition at the Japanese Embassy to protest against Koizumi's visit to the war shrine. "They (the Japanese invaders) have trampled their feet in the blood of Asia's people," protester Zhang Jianyong read from a statement in front of the embassy.

In Seoul, South Korean Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon summoned Japanese Ambassador Shotaro Oshima to protest the visit, expressing Seoul's "deep regrets."

"It's not an exaggeration to say that Koizumi's visit to the Yasukuni Shrine has been the biggest stumbling block that has strained South Korea-Japan relations," Ban told Oshima.

"Our government has repeatedly requested that he not visit the shrine, which enshrines war criminals who inflicted indescribable suffering and pain in the past."

Later yesterday, South Korea's presidential spokesman Kim Man-soo said a summit between President Roh Moo-hyun and Koizumi scheduled later this year would be "difficult."

(China Daily October 18, 2005)