Academics and other commentators Friday blasted a government panel's recommendation that women and their descendants be allowed to ascend to the Chrysanthemum Throne, claiming it would break with tradition.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>'The Imperial household is supporting Japanese culture at the core. The issue should be discussed over more time,' diplomatic analyst and group member Hideaki Kase said.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>The government plans to submit a bill to revise the Imperial Household Law in accordance with the panel's proposal during next year's ordinary Diet session.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>The panel unveiled its final report Thursday. It also advocated granting succession priority to the reigning monarch's firstborn child, regardless of gender.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>The current law limits successors to male heirs who have emperors on their father's side. This has fueled fears of an Imperial succession crisis because no male heir has been born to the Imperial family since 1965.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>The critics said the panel had neglected several important problems, including finding ways to gain public support for preserving the male-line tradition and discussing the role of a female monarch's husband, which would be a historic first.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>The group said families that previously were branches of the Imperial family but were divested of royal status in 1947 should return to the fold as a means of preserving the male succession system. The panel ruled this option out, citing difficulty in obtaining public support, given that these families have been living as commoners for nearly 60 years.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>'The panel apparently allows a commoner to become a female monarch's husband and an Imperial family member, so isn't it the same with a member of a former Imperial family branch regaining the Imperial status? The panel report is not logical,' said Tetsuo Ito, another member of the group and chief of the Japan Policy Institute, a conservative think tank.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>In a statement, the group called for the government and the Diet to 'listen to the will of Imperial family members and various opinions of the public.'</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>Imperial family members are forbidden to interfere in political issues.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>Nevertheless, Prince Tomohito of Mikasa, a cousin of Emperor Akihito, published a 'private' essay questioning the idea of having the child of a female monarch ascend to the throne -- a scenario experts say would be unprecedented.</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi on Friday described the panel's report as 'meaningful' and 'a reasonable conclusion.'</PARAGRAPH> <PARAGRAPH>'We would like to finalize it as the consensus of the public. There may be various opinions, but –

would like to answer them during the discussions" in the Diet, he said.

If the law is revised on the basis of the panel's proposal, 3-year-old Princess Aiko, the only child of Crown Prince Naruhito and Crown Princess Masako, will be next in line to the throne after her father.