Japan's lawmakers line up to cast their ballots during a plenary session for a vote on security laws at the upper house of the parliament in Tokyo, Japan, on Sept. 19, 2015. Japan abandoned its 70-year pacifism since the end of World War II as the parliament's upper house on early Saturday enacted a controversial legislation pushed forward by the government under Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. (Xinhua/Ma Ping)
TOKYO, Sept. 20 (Xinhua) -- The approval rate for Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's Cabinet fell to 38.9 percent after the enactment of the controversial security bills, a recent poll result showed Sunday.
According to the poll conducted by Japan's Kyodo News Agency on Saturday and Sunday, the support rate for Abe Cabinet was down 4.3 percent from 43.2 percent in the previous survey in mid-August. While the disapproval rate increased to 50.2 percent from 46.4 percent.
Regarding the security bills, which would allow Japanese troops to flight abroad even Japan itself is not attacked, 79 percent of respondents said there were not enough deliberations in the Diet. Only 14.1 percent people believed the Diet sufficiently deliberated the bills.
About 68 percent of the respondents said the new legislation will increase the risk of Japanese troops getting involved in an armed conflict, while only 2.5 percent said it will lower such a risk and 27.1 percent believe the new laws will have no effect on the possibility of the troops being dragged into a war.
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China Voice: Japan's new security bills betrayal to its own people
BEIJING, Sept. 19 (Xinhua) -- Japan's new security bills not only broke Japan's promise to the world after World War II, but also betrayed its own people, formerly protected by a pacifist constitution.
Japan abandoned 70 years of peaceful defense with the controversial legislation pushed forward by the government of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, which allows Japan to deploy troops to foreign battlefields so long as its allies are under attack or Japan claims to feel threatened. Full story
News Analysis: Japan's pacifist ideals stripped as Abe steps closer to resurrecting old war machine
TOKYO, Sept. 19 (Xinhua) -- Following intense wrangling in Japan's upper house of parliament between the coalition led by the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and opposition parties, culminating in frantic chaos as lawmakers opposed to the war bills tried to physically impede a final round of debate in the upper caucus, the controversial legislation was eventually enacted early Saturday that marks the biggest security shift in Japan in 70 years.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's contentious war bills were passed despite the best, albeit last minute, ditch attempts by the opposition camp to block the bills' passage into law, which included submitting a number of no-confidence and censure motions against ruling party and Diet members, Abe's Cabinet and, indeed, the prime minister himself. Full story
Commentary: Japan takes step toward old militarism with new war stance
TOKYO, Sept. 19 (Xinhua) -- Japan's military stance has potentially become more dangerous as its hawkish and historical revisionist Prime Minister Shinzo Abe now holds an active war button following the country's parliament in the early hours of Saturday enacting laws that could usher Japan into war again for the first time in 70 years.
The overturning of Japan's 70-year defense posture was finished in less than three years since Abe returned to power in late 2012. The extraordinary efficiency, however, was never seen to be utilized to revive Japan's 20-year stagnant economy by the prime minister who vowed to prioritize economic issues. Full story
China Voice: Is Japan bound up to battle chariot?
BEIJING, Sept. 18 (Xinhua) -- No nation is more alert than China when Japan's ruling coalition was trying a final push on Friday to enact the unpopular security bills that will expand the role of the country's Self-Defense Forces (SDF).
Eerily, Sept. 18 this year marks the 84th anniversary of the invasion of northeast China by Japanese troops. Full story
