BEIJING, July 14: China on Thursday lambasted a Japanese town’s decision to adopt nationalist textbooks which downplay its wartime atrocities, saying the move will damage relations and mislead younger generations. “The right-wing textbooks strived to downplay and excuse Japan from its political and ethical responsibilities,” foreign ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao told a press briefing.

“This sort of textbook entering the classroom will seriously mislead and harm young people,” he said.

He called on Japan to give its younger generations a correct understanding of its militarist past and to face up to its history for the sake of improving its relations with its Asian neighbours and its international image.

The education board of Otawara, an industrial and agricultural town 300 kilometres north of Tokyo, voted unanimously on Wednesday to use the controversial history and civics books at 12 junior high schools from April.

The books make only passing mention of atrocities committed by Japanese troops in Asia in the first half of the 20th century.

The text makes no mention of the women sexually enslaved by Japanese troops during their invasions of Asia and refers to the Nanjing massacre in China as just an “incident” in which “many” Chinese died.

The education ministry approved the history textbook in April as one of eight that can be used to instruct students aged 13 to 15 in the next school year.

The decision led both Beijing and Seoul to summon Japanese ambassadors and triggered successive weekends of anti-Japanese protests in China, where Japanese diplomatic property and restaurants were ransacked.—AFP