Japan held its annual ceremony Sunday to observe the 65th anniversary of the end of World War II, remembering 3.1 million soldiers and civilians who perished in the battle. On August 15, 1945, then-emperor Hirohito said in a rare public announcement that the nation accepted the terms of its surrender.
Some 6,000 people, including Emperor Akihito, Empress Michiko and Prime Minister Naoto Kan attended Sunday's ceremony in central Tokyo. At noon, participants observed a minute's silence in memory of the victims of the war. The oldest person to attend the ceremony was Chiyoka Takakura, 96, from Osaka in western Japan, whose husband was an Imperial Army soldier who died in the Philippines. The youngest was 4-year-old Shu Yonamine from Okinawa, whose great-grandfather died in the battle, Kyodo News reported.
More than 100,000 people were expected to visit Yasukuni Shrine in central Tokyo, a war memorial that honours Japan's 2.5 million war dead including convicted war criminals.
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