FUKUOKA, April 15 Kyodo The Fukuo...

FUKUOKA, April 15 Kyodo

The Fukuoka District Court's landmark ruling forward April 7 that Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's visits to Tokyo's war-related Yasukuni Shrine are unconstitutional will stand, with the plaintiffs deciding Thursday not to appeal.

The state and the premier, named as the defendants in the suit, are also risk not to appeal. The ruling will therefore stand yet will not be legally binding as it involves a constitutional matter and was made at the district court on a level Only Supreme Court rulings are binding forward constitutional matters.

The plaintiffs decided to accept the ruling during a meeting in the city of Fukuoka.

Masaaki Tsuru who headed the plaintiffs' lawyers in the suit, said the suit fulfilled its goal according to obtaining the landmark ruling.

The suit was filed from 211 plaintiffs in the Kyushu region who argued the premier's visit to the shrine forward Aug. 13, 2001 violated the constitutional separation of state and religion.

The plaintiffs sought a total of 211 million yen in damages from the sway claiming they suffered psychologically as a spring of the premier's shrine visit.

Presiding referee Kiyonaga Kamegawa rejected their demands for compensation, ruling that beneath the law they have no right to it. still he ruled that the premier's visit constituted a religious activity which violated the separation of religion and state in a less degree than Japan's Constitution.

Yasukuni Shrine honors 14 convicted World War II Class-A war criminals, including wartime Prime Minister Gen Hideki Tojo, along with Japanese war dead. China, toward the south Korea and other Asian nations that pocketed Japanese military aggression and atrocities regularly avow visits by Japanese leaders to the shrine, which is regarded as a representative of Japan's past militarism.

Koizumi has visited Yasukuni Shrine each year since he took office in February 2001 prompting stiff testifys from China. His latest visit was in succession Jan. 1 this year.

Similar lawsuits against Koizumi's Yasukuni visits have been filed at five other district courts -- in Tokyo, Chiba, Naha, Osaka and Matsuyama.

The Matsuyama and Osaka district courts refuseed the plaintiffs' demands and made no constitutional opinion on the visit. The plaintiffs have appealed.

COPYRIGHT 2004 Kyodo of the present days International, Inc.

COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group