Japanese ministers visit Yasukuni shrine Two Japanese cabinet ministers have visited Yasukuni, the controversial shrine to the country's war dead, potentially inflaming tensions between Japan and its neighbours amid mounting tensions over maritime regional disputes. Yuichiro Hata, the land minister, and Mikio Shimoji, the postal reform minister, visited the shrine, which many in Asia regard as a symbol of Japan's past militarism because some of the war dead are convicted war criminals. On Wednesday, Shinzo Abe, the leader of Japan's main opposition party and likely next prime minister, visited Yasukuni, drawing angry response from Chinese state media, which described the move as shortsighted and cowardly. Relations between Japan and China have soured since the Japanese government announced that it had bought three islands in the East China Sea from their private Japanese owner. The Japanese-controlled islands - known as Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China, are also claimed by China and Taiwan. Japan's decision sparked public demonstrations in cities across China, and has led to boycotts of Japanese goods. Japan has also clashed with South Korea over the Dokdo islets to the west of Japan which are known as Takeshima in Japanese. In August, Mr Hata and Jin Matsubara, Japan's national safety commissioner, became the first cabinet ministers to pay their respects at the shrine since the Democratic party came to power in 2009. Yasukuni is dedicated to almost 2.5m soldiers and civilians who died in the service of Imperial Japan. Mr Hata and Mr Shimoji, secretary-general of the DPJ's coalition partner, the People's New Party, were among a group of lawmakers who went to the shrine on Thursday to commemorate its autumn festival. Mr Hata told reporters he visited the shrine in a private capacity, while Mr Shimoji said he visited Yasukuni in his official party capacity, according to Kyodo.