Japan förnekar militärens roll i massjälvmord på Okinawa 1945 (Länk)

Other changes are similar - the change to a passive verb, the disappearance of a subject - and combine to erase the responsibility of the Japanese military. In explaining its policy change, the ministry said that it "is not clear that the Japanese Army coerced or ordered the mass suicides." As with Abe's denial regarding sexual slavery, the ministry's new position appeared to discount overwhelming evidence of coercion, particularly the testimony of victims and survivors themselves. "There are many Okinawans who have testified that the Japanese Army directed them to commit suicide," Ryukyu Shimpo, one of the two major Okinawan newspapers, said in an angry editorial. "There are also people who have testified that they were handed grenades by Japanese soldiers" to blow themselves up. The editorial described the change as a politically influenced decision that "went along with the government view."