TOKYO, Sept 20: Shinzo Abe, a conservative advocate of a more muscular Japanese foreign policy, was overwhelmingly elected ruling party leader on Wednesday, setting the stage for him to be chosen as prime minister next week.

Abe, who will become Japan’s first prime minister born after the World War II, has pledged to rewrite Japan’s pacifist constitution, forge even tighter security ties with close ally Washington and put more patriotism into Japanese classrooms.

He has also promised to seek a thaw in ties with China and South Korea, chilled by outgoing Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi’s visits to Tokyo’s Yasukuni war shrine. But he has stressed that better relations require efforts on all sides.

“It’s important that leaders meet each other periodically for talks,” he told public broadcaster NHK.—Reuters