Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi offered a ritual artifact at the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo today (October 17).

According to Kyodo News and NHK, Prime Minister Takaichi offered a ritual artifact known as a masakaki under the name "Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi" on the occasion of the shrine's autumn festival, which began today.

Citing sources close to the prime minister, Kyodo News reported that Prime Minister Takaichi plans to refrain from visiting the Yasukuni Shrine in person during the three-day autumn festival that runs through October 19.

Kyodo News interpreted this as an effort to avoid diplomatic friction with neighboring countries such as South Korea and China that could arise from visiting the shrine.

Before taking office as president of the Liberal Democratic Party in October of last year, Prime Minister Takaichi regularly visited the Yasukuni Shrine during the spring and autumn festivals, as well as on August 15, which marks South Korea's liberation day and Japan's World War II defeat anniversary.

However, since assuming the party presidency in October of last year, she has not visited the shrine during the autumn festival that month or the spring festival after taking office as prime minister.

On August 15, Liberation Day, she paid for a ritual offering called a tamagushiryo out of her own pocket in her capacity as LDP leader and performed yobai, bowing toward the shrine from a distance instead of visiting in person.

Among cabinet members, Minister for Economic and Fiscal Policy Minoru Kiuchi visited the shrine today.

The Yasukuni Shrine honors the spirits of some 2.466 million people who died in civil wars around the Meiji Restoration and numerous wars waged by Japanese imperialism.

Nearly 90 percent of them, or about 2.133 million spirits, are tied to the Pacific War, notably including Class-A war criminals from World War II such as former Prime Minister Hideki Tojo, who were executed following the International Military Tribunal for the Far East (the Tokyo Trials).

(Photo: AP, Yonhap News)