Taiwan ex-president begins controversial visit in JapanEd: Adds criticism by Taiwan activist over Lee's shrine visit plan (1st Lead)

May 30, 2007, 8:03 GMT

Tokyo - Defying protests from China, former Taiwan president Lee Teng-hui arrived in Japan Wednesday to deliver speeches in Tokyo and to re-enact a journey taken by a 17th-century Japanese haiku poet, media reports said.

In a move likely to further enrage Taiwan's rivals in Beijing, Lee, 84, unveiled his plan to visit the war-related Yasukuni Shrine, which honours, among others, Lee's older brother, according to Kyodo News Agency.

'It could be the last visit to Japan in my life,' he said. 'My older brother is enshrined there. As his brother, I cannot bear not to pay a tribute.'

Yasukuni Shrine, which is known to honour millions of war dead including convicted war criminals, has been a source of diplomatic dispute between Tokyo and many of imperial Japan's World War II victims in China, Korea and elsewhere in Asia.

Lee's shrine visiting plan drew an angry protest by anti-Japanese militarism activists in Taiwan, who said it would be highly improper for him to go there.

'Being a former leader of Taiwan, Lee Teng-hui should have been well aware of the sensitivity of the matter and should refrain from visiting the shrine,' said indigenous parliamentarian Kao-Chin Su-may, in Taipei.

Ms Kao-chin twice led dozens of Taiwanese activists to demonstrate near the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo last year, demanding an apology and compensation from Japan over tens of thousands of Taiwanese drafted to fight for Japanese imperial government during World War II. Taiwan had been under Japan's colonial rule for five decades before Japan surrendered in 1945.

She said she understood the feeling of Lee to pay tribute to his elder brother, but if the ex-president really visits the war shrine, he would be 'condemned by Taiwanese people because such an act would be a great insult to Taiwanese and high disrespect to the victims and their families.'

Taiwan's current government under President Chen Shui-bian, which is friendly to Japan, was tight-lipped over Lee's planned visit to the shrine, saying it would not comment on a matter that has yet to happen.

Lee's Japan visit has also irked Beijing, which has expressed grave concern over his latest trip.

China has long opposed Lee's Japan visit because it considers him among Taiwan's most hard-core pro-independence leaders.

The former president of Taiwan, however, has insisted his 11-day visit to Japan is an exchange of cultural and academic views, and not politically-motivated.

He said he plans to visit several provinces in Japan to follow a five-month journey taken by the famous poet Matsuo Basho.

As president, Lee reclassified Taiwan's relations with China as 'special state-to-state' ties in 1999, in an attempt to place the island in an equal status to that of the mainland.

The move enraged Beijing, which considers Taiwan a wayward province and opposes any move toward independence.