Documents on Yasukuni Shrine recently released by the National Diet Library shows that the then Health and Welfare Ministry actively involved itself in the enshrinement process for Japan's war dead at Yasukuni Shrine, including Class-A war criminals. The close relationship between the government and Yasukuni, whose status changed from an entity under national control to a religious corporation after World War II, should be regarded as violation of the separation of religion and state -- a key principle of the Constitution. It shows that the people involved -- Yasukuni priests and officials of the ministry's War Victims' Relief Bureau (many of the latter being former armed forces officers) -- either ignored or were not conscious of the principle.

Then Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's visits to Yasukuni Shrine -- which enshrines 2.46 million war dead -- each year from 2001 to 2006 prompted the collection of documents by the National Diet Library. Several Diet members asked the library to collect relevant material to help them learn more about the shrine's history and character. The library started compiling the material in January 2006. In July of that year, Yasukuni offered material that had not been made public to the library.

The documents are valuable in that they disclose the concrete manner in which the ministry advised and made requests of the shrine. In a meeting held at the shrine on April 9, 1958, for example, the ministry suggested that Yasukuni enshrine Class-B and Class-C war criminals "in a way that is inconspicuous." (Class-B war criminals were charged with ordinary war crimes while Class-C war criminals were charged with crimes against humanity. Class-A war criminals were charged with crimes against peace.) But a document prepared by the ministry April 4, 1959, shows its uneasiness over public reaction to the enshrinement of Class-B and Class-C war criminals, adding that if Yasukuni enshrined them it could have a bad effect on future enshrinements. This statement may suggest that the ministry was thinking of enshrining Class-A war criminals who had been tried by the International Military Tribunal for the Far East.