In a recent speech before the United Nations General Assembly, former Prime Minister Kiichi Miyazawa proposed that an international conference be held urgently to discuss ways of bringing peace to Afghanistan and rebuilding the war-torn country. Foreign Minister Makiko Tanaka, not the 82-year-old Miyazawa, was to deliver the speech but failed to attend the session.

The meeting was attended by government leaders and foreign ministers from more than 150 countries in the wake of the terrorist attacks in the United States and U.S.-led military response in Afghanistan. Tanaka was also absent from the foreign ministers' conference of the Group of Eight industrial nations, held about the same time in New York. To miss a golden opportunity to take the initiative in multilateral and bilateral diplomacy regarding Afghanistan was a grave mistake.

The official reason given for Tanaka's absence from the meetings was that she had to take part in important Diet debate. However, the real problem stemmed from Tanaka's high-profile discord with Foreign Ministry bureaucrats and her bizarre conduct, which drew strong criticism not only from opposition parties but also from government and ruling-party officials. Her qualifications as foreign minister are in serious doubt. If the present situation is left uncorrected, Japan's national interest will be seriously impaired.