hankyoreh

Political parties Tuesday expressed worry over Japan's move to rewrite its pacifist constitution, claiming it could be a sign of a reemergence of Japanese militarism.

Japan's parliament on Monday approved a law setting steps for revising the constitution, boosting Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's drive to expand military operations overseas.

The constitution, drafted by U.S. occupation forces in 1947 after Japan's defeat in World War II, put limits on the country's military, particularly Article 9 that bans the use of force to settle international disputes.

"We have serious concerns in that Japan will be able to possess a military and that could lead to the revival of its imperial militarism," Rep. Na Kyung-won, spokesman of the main opposition Grand National Party, told reporters.

The South Korean government did not issue an official statement.

A Foreign Ministry official said, however, that Seoul was keeping an eye on the controversial move.

"That was a domestic step to make procedures to revise the constitution... but we are keeping an eye on it with strong attention," a Foreign Ministry official dealing with Northeast Asian affairs said.

The pro-government Uri Party accused Tokyo of trying to restore its wartime aggression while neglecting "true reflections on its history including the issue of comfort women."

Abe ignited a furor with remarks about Japan's sexual exploitation of Korean and other Asian women during World War II, denying that those women were coerced to work in Japanese military brothels although it has been proven by historians and records.

Korean women were the major victims of Japan's 1910-1945 colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula.

Under the law approved by the Japanese parliament's upper house, a referendum on revising the constitution can be held as early as in 2010.
SEOUL, May 15 (Yonhap News)