How Shinzo Abe reawakened Japan's protest movement, outraged at his rethink of constitution
Abe's government argues the changes are needed for Japan to respond to a harsher security environment, including a more assertive China and growing terrorist threats.
Mothers held their children's hands stood in the light rain, holding up anti-war placards, while students chanted slogans against Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his defence policies to the beat of a drum.
In Japan, the ranks of protesters are typically made up of labour union members and greying leftist activists.
But on Sunday, tens of thousands from all walks of life filled the streets outside Tokyo's parliament to rally against new security legislation likely to become law in September.
"No to war legislation!" "Scrap the bills now!" and "Abe, quit!" they chanted in one of the summer's biggest protests. Their cries were against a series of bills that would expand Japan's military role under a reinterpretation of the country's war-renouncing constitution.
In Japan, where people generally don't express political views in public, such rallies have largely diminished since the often violent university student protests in the early 1960s. Anti-nuclear protests after the 2011 Fukushima disaster also petered out.
Smaller protests were held elsewhere across the nation on Sunday. The demonstrations started earlier this year but grew sharply after July, when Abe's ruling party and its junior coalition partner pushed the legislation through the more powerful lower house despite vocal opposition from other parties - and media polls showing the majority of Japanese opposed the bills.