中国

about the history of the Japanese apologies (official or grass-roots)
NOT THAT I CARE, BUT FOR GODDAMN FAIRNESS SAKE

See below:

China People's Daily
Tuesday, October 09, 2001, updated at 09:43(GMT+8)
China

Japanese PM Koizumi Expresses Heartfelt Apology over Aggression

Japanese PM Lays Wreath at War Memorial Hall
Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi expressed his heartfelt apology and condolences Monday to those Chinese who lost their lives in the war waged by Japan half a century ago.

After visiting the Lugou (Marco Polo) Bridge and the Memorial Hall of the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, Koizumi said to the press that he has come to understand the miseries of war more deeply after looking at this exhibition and offers heartfelt apology and condolences to the Chinese victims of Japanese aggression.

After his arrival in Beijing, Koizumi went straight to the Lugou bridge and then to the nearby Memorial Hall. After bowing he placed a wreath beneath a large statue and mourned in silence for a moment. The statue, entitled the "Great Wall of Bones and Flesh," depicts loyalist Chinese soldiers armed with guns.

He is the first Japanese Prime Minister to have laid a wreath at the hall.

In May 1995, the then Japanese Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama also visited the hall.


Topic: Japan Apologizes to Korea
Katrina Jones, upenn.com November 1999

Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi of Japan offered an apology to South Korea for Japanese war-time actions, specifically pertaining to Korean women who were forced to work as prostitutes in Japanese military brothels during World War II. The Japanese Statement came in a meeting with visiting South Korean president Kim Dae-jung. Although it is not the the first time that Japan has apologized to Korea for its war-time misconduct, this statment was given extra weight because it was included in a joint declaration issued by the two leaders called the ``new partnership''. This agreement opened up new areas of cooperation between the two countries, including the Asian financial crisis and stability on the Korean Peninsula.


Monday, August 24, 1998 Published at 08:59 GMT 09:59 UK BBC

Japanese war criminals make apology

Bodies were dumped in mass graves at Nanking

In an emotional webcast, a group of Japanese war criminals have recounted their roles in some of the most gruesome events in military history.
Four elderly veterans spoke from Tokyo about atrocities committed during Japan's occupation of China. A global Internet audience was able to monitor the event which was beamed to the Simon Wiesenthal Center's Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles.

Shiro Azuma, who took part in what became known as the Rape of Nanking, confessed he had killed 37 women, children and elderly people.

"We were able to kill them because we despised them," he said. "We didn't respect their rights. The Japanese army in general did not respect human rights at all."

As many as 300,000 people were killed as the then-capital Nanking was looted and burned after its capture in 1937.

"I am so sorry, I would like a judge to punish me. That is the only way I can repent," said a comrade, Hakudo Nagatomi.

The organiser of the event, Rabbi Abraham Cooper, praised the moral courage of the men in speaking out and the presence of members of the Japanese media after some of their politicians had insisted atrocities had never taken place