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Generate an appropriate single-sentence summary for the given text such that it includes the main topic of the text.
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By Dr John Swenson-WrightHead, Asia Programme, Chatham House It signalled Japan's capitulation and the end not only of the war in the Pacific, but also of Japan's colonial rule of the Korean peninsula, its influence in South East Asia and its attempt to dominate China and the Asian mainland. With Japan's conservative Prime Minister Shinzo Abe planning to issue an official statement reflecting on the past, this year is a particularly sensitive anniversary. Progressive critics, inside and outside Japan, worry that Mr Abe's statement may downplay past apologies in favour of a "revisionist" historical interpretation that will antagonise Japan's neighbours, most notably China and South Korea. How were Hirohito's words received at the time? Hirohito's remarks that day were unprecedented. Pre-recorded on a phonograph and delivered in rarefied, classical Japanese, they shocked a Japanese populace, which was unprepared for the possibility of surrender or defeat and had almost certainly never heard their divine head of state speak in public. The country was still on a war footing. That was despite the near total destruction of Japan's navy by July 1945, a policy of economic strangulation that had imposed massive material hardship on ordinary citizens, the firebombing of major cities, and the atomic devastation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki on 6 and 9 August. The cathartic impact of the emperor's words allowed the public to embrace the once alien concept of defeat. The statement was also a necessary means of forcing consensus on a fractious Japanese political and military elite, some of whose members were determined to fight to the last. Hirohito's acceptance of defeat, which was backed by his senior ministers, almost failed in the face of an abortive coup by young army officers who were trying to stop the imperial broadcast from going ahead. For an emperor mindful of the impact of America's "new and most cruel bomb", surrender (even if he chose not to use the term) was a means of avoiding the total destruction of Japan and further civilian casualties, and revealingly, the possible "total extinction of human civilisation". What happened next? The end of the war prompted jubilant celebrations in Europe and the US. In Korea it led to a similar outpouring of optimism as Koreans experienced their liberation from 35 years of Japanese colonial rule. Koreans also saw the brief establishment of a progressive Korean People's Republic in the south of the country. However, such optimism was short-lived, as US forces intervened to establish an American-led military government in September 1945, while Soviet forces created their own dependent government in the north of a peninsula increasingly divided along geographical and ideological lines. Ironically, the Americans turned to former Japanese colonial administrators to handle the civilian administration of Korea, a decision that made Koreans deeply sceptical of US intentions, reinforcing the belief (still present to this day) that Korea's interests take second place to those of more powerful states. What were the consequences for Japan and regional rivalries? Japan's defeat had profound and in some ways contradictory consequences for the East Asian region and the wider post-war world. It facilitated a US-led seven-year occupation of Japan that, in its first two years, promoted democratisation and demilitarisation. Japan established a new identity of anti-militarism, aversion to nuclear weapons and a focus on economic development that ultimately produced the high-speed miracle years of the 1960s. More controversially, the continuing occupation, especially from 1948, reflected the onset of the Cold War in East Asia. US policy makers worried about ideological divisions within Japan, the growing ascendancy of Mao's communist forces in mainland China and the Soviet presence in Japan's "northern territories" (the Kurile islands occupied by the Russians in the closing days of the war and still held by Moscow to this day). Japan, as America's most important emerging ally in the region, became bound into the strategic and ideological conflict between the communist and Western blocs, but in a manner that, some critics contend, fatally limited its autonomy and policy-making independence. How has strategic balance in the region changed since then? From the vantage point of 2015, the 15 August anniversary is a reminder that Japan under Prime Minister Abe is still confronting difficult strategic challenges that echo those of 70 years ago. These include a Russia that is unwilling to cede territory to Japan, and a still-divided Korean peninsula but one in which North Korea is now a de facto nuclear state and therefore a more threatening power. Compared to 1945, China is a much more powerful actor able, through its more assertive maritime presence, to challenge the territorial possessions of its neighbours in the South China and (in the case of Japan) East China Seas. What is the contemporary significance of Hirohito's comments announcing Japan's surrender? Hirohito characterised Japan's decision to go to war as an attempt to "ensure Japan's self-preservation and the stabilisation of East Asia". Controversially, he also pointed out that there was no intention "to infringe upon the sovereignty of other nations or to embark on territorial aggrandisement". While past Japanese prime ministers have acknowledged the suffering that Japan caused its neighbours during the Pacific War and expressed their "remorse", there are some conservative voices in Japan who identify with the sentiment embodied in Hirohito's August 1945 statement. To them, Japan's past actions were neither aggressive nor illegitimate, and they have been lobbying Mr Abe to reflect this alternative interpretation in his own, contemporary statement. It remains unclear to what extent the prime minister shares these views. What balance will Mr Abe need to strike? Given the historical sensitivities involved, any expression of such conservative views would invite condemnation from China and South Korea, as well as from progressive opinion within Japan, at a time when the Abe administration is seeking to pass new legislation to enhance the strategic flexibility of its self-defence forces. For these reasons, as well as the need to avoid antagonising its US ally, which has called on Japan to avoid inflaming historical tensions, the government is likely to tread carefully. History, it seems, is anything but an academic matter. Mr Abe will need to be agile in pursuing a pragmatic foreign policy agenda while maintaining the support of his more conservative allies at home. Dr John Swenson-Wright is head of the Asia Programme at the Chatham House think tank. Chatham House will host the conference The Future of Capitalist Democracy: UK-Japan Perspectives on 21-22 September 2015.'
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This Saturday it will be 70 years since Japan's Emperor, Hirohito, publicly accepted the surrender terms of the key Allied countries in World War Two.


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Paul Priestly, the accounting officer with the Department of Regional Development, said NIW refused him access to its internal audit reports. He said the company's awarding of 73 contracts valued at £28m, without competition, was "rightly to be condemned". "We have been let down by those charged with the stewardship of Northern Ireland Water," he said. However, Mr Priestly insisted he took "swift and appropriate action" when the failings came to light and it was regrettable that the situation was not unearthed earlier. He said the failures had been going on for three years but that "no red flag" had been raised to him as the department's accounting officer. Ethics "We were let down by the board and executives of Northern Ireland Water," Mr Priestly added. Committee chairman Paul Maskey said members had not come across a more serious case of "complete disregard for public sector ethics". NIW's chief executive Laurence MacKenzie told the committee there was a reticence among its staff to tell the department anything. The company's chairman, Chris Mellor, and three other board members were sacked earlier this year following an independent report. The report found that there had been a "serious breakdown in the governance and control framework" of the company. Regional Development Minister Conor Murphy said the company could be open to legal action over the way contracts were awarded. Four new interim directors were appointed this week.
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The contract procedures of NI Water which led to the sackings of four board members were "shocking and indefensible" a top civil servant has told the Public Accounts Committee.


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Suzy Angus is part of the Speak Out Survivors group campaigning to scrap the need for corroboration in Scots law. Corroboration means two separate sources of evidence are needed for a case to go to trial. The campaigners will meet MSPs at Holyrood later. They are also due to raise the issue in a meeting with Justice Secretary Humza Yousaf. Ms Angus told BBC Scotland's The Nine that she had tried to take her case to court, but it was dropped because of the need for corroboration, which is a unique feature of Scots law. She said she was raped for the first time when she was 13-years-old. Over the next two years, she said she was raped and sexually abused multiple times by a group of six men. 'I just felt like collapsing' She said that having to recount "incredibly detailed information" that she had "buried for over 40 years" has left her on medication for PTSD and anxiety. Investigating the case and trying to bring it to court was a long and complicated process. She said: "Because there were several people involved, it took about 18 months, probably, for everybody to be investigated. After one man was arrested, she felt hopeful of a prosecution: "I was getting quite interested in the fact that maybe finally there will be a prosecution, and they said 'Sorry, no corroboration, that's the end of the line'. "I was standing in my office at work on the phone and that was it, and I just felt like collapsing." Now, she is campaigning, along with other survivors of sexual abuse, for corroboration to be dropped. In 2014 SNP ministers had proposed abolishing the need for corroboration, although this was dropped in 2015 after a review by former high court judge Lord Bonomy recommended it should be retained in some circumstances. Ms Angus said she appreciated why the standard of evidence should remain high: "I understand that you do have to protect people. "I'm not for changing the law just so people will be falsely convicted, of course not, the law has to protect everybody and everyone deserves a defence. "However, it's the quality and sometimes the quantity of evidence." In her case, however, she thinks that had there been no requirement for corroboration there would have been enough evidence for a prosecution. "In my case it was patterns of behaviour over several people that would have taken someone to court and you know it's jut left me feeling kind of defeated, to be honest." Brian McConnachie QC said that the merits of corroboration had already been debated and a decision had already been made for it to be continued. He said: "I know that some people consider that corroboration is something which we ought to abandon or abolish, and as often as not the argument is given that it should be abolished because nobody else has it. "I've never been convinced by that argument. "We went through a process where it was discussed at significant and considerable length, and at the end of that process the decision was taken that it should go no further." Jury research A Scottish government spokeswoman said: "There was no parliamentary or legal consensus for the removal of the corroboration requirement. "We asked Lord Bonomy to conduct a review into what additional safeguards may be required if the corroboration rule was removed. "The review recommended research into jury reasoning and decision-making should be undertaken so that any changes to the jury system are made on a fully informed basis." She added: "Any future consideration of corroboration reform needs to await the findings of the jury research, which we expect to be complete by Autumn 2019. "Since the review reported, we have taken forward a wide range of measures to improve how the justice system deals with allegations of sexual offending and to improve support for victims. "The justice secretary and lord advocate co-chair a new victims' taskforce to improve the provision of advice and information for victims of crime and their families and the Scottish government also legislated to introduce statutory jury directions in certain sexual offence cases."
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A woman who says she was sexually abused as a child has told the BBC she felt "defeated" after trying to seek justice.


