China urges Abe to send right message with speech

China urged Japan to send a "clear and correct" message on its wartime responsibility as Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is expected to make a statement marking the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II next week. In a report released as a reference for his upcoming statement, a 16-member panel to Abe mentioned the country's wartime aggression and colonial rule, but stopped short of saying whether the prime minister should apologize for the atrocities. "China and other Asian countries as well as the world are watching the Japanese leader's upcoming speech closely," Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said Friday, Only by reflecting on the war can Japan realize real reconciliation with its Asian neighbors, she added. Abe said Thursday he would express "remorse" over WWII. He has reiterated that he would follow the Murayama Statement as a whole but would not repeat such words as "heartfelt apology" or "aggression and colonial rule" in his war anniversary statement, maintaining there is no universal definition for "aggression." Meanwhile, a Populus poll conducted in Japan revealed that some 60 percent of over 1,000 respondents believed that Washington should officially apologize to the victims of the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and 74 percent said the bombings were not justified, reported Russia's Sputnik News.