South Korean media slams ‘provocative’ photo of Japan's Abe

Major South Korean newspapers splashed a photo of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in a military jet trainer on their front pages on Wednesday, saying it was a reminder of Japan’s colonial-era atrocities.

The picture in question showed a smiling Abe giving a thumbs-up while sitting in the cockpit of an air force T-4 training jet emblazoned with the number 731.

The number evoked memories of Unit 731 - a covert Japanese biological and chemical warfare research facility that carried out lethal human experiments during the 1937-45 Sino-Japanese War and World War II.

The unit was based in the northeastern Chinese city of Harbin, and held prisoners from China, South Korea and the Soviet Union.

The press in Seoul suggested the Abe picture was an intended affront to countries like China and South Korea which had suffered under Japanese occupation and colonisation.

“Abe’s endless provocation!” said the picture caption on the front page of the country’s largest daily, the Chosun Ilbo.

“Abe’s pose resurrects horrors of Unit 731,” ran the headline in the English-language Korea JoongAng Daily.