DHAKA: Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has visited the US naval base at Pearl Harbor, where he offered “sincere and everlasting condolences” to the victims of Japan's attack on the base 75 years ago.

“We must never repeat the horrors of war again, this is the solemn vow the people of Japan have taken,” he said, reports BBC.

Abe was accompanied by US President Barack Obama, making the visit the first by the leaders of both countries.

Japan devastated much of the base, killing more than 2,400 Americans.

Abe paid tribute to the men who lost their lives in 1941 at the naval base, many of whom remain entombed in the wreckage of the USS Arizona, sunk by the Japanese that day, and vowed reconciliation and peace.

To the souls of the US servicemen who lie aboard the USS Arizona, to the American people, and all people around the world, I pledge that unwavering vow,” he said.

The Japanese prime minister went on to praise the US for its efforts to mend relations with Japan following the war between the two countries, which ended shortly after the US dropped two atomic bombs on Japan in August 1945.

And he called the renewed alliance between the countries an “alliance of hope”.

Obama also paid tribute to the dead, saying that he had laid a wreath on “waters that still weep”.

Abe is the first Japanese leader to visit the memorial on the site of the Arizona, although several of his predecessors have been to Pearl Harbor in the past.

He and Obama laid wreaths at the site and the two leaders prayed for the dead.
But, as expected, Abe did not issue an apology for the attack.

Japan's surprise attack on Pearl Harbor damaged all eight of the US battleships at the base and sunk four of them, propelling the US into World War Two.

On Monday, Abe visited the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific and laid a wreath.

Abe's visit, three weeks after the 75th anniversary of the attack, follows a visit earlier this year to Hiroshima by Obama.

He became the first serving US president to visit the Japanese city, where about 150,000 people are believed to have been killed in 1945 by a US atomic bomb.

BDST: 1745 HRS, DEC 28, 2016
AP