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Kathy Gao

Education authorities in Shanghai have punished a kindergarten teacher and its principal, and ordered the school to apologise, after a Japanese wartime march song was played at its graduation ceremony.
The Warship March, the official marching music of the Japanese Maritime Self-Defence Force and its former Imperial navy, was used as the background music by the Shanghai Zhendan Foreign Language Kindergarten during the June 27 ceremony.
The education department of Zhabei district in Shanghai confirmed this in a statement on Thursday evening.
The school suspended the responsible directors from their duties after a clip of the ceremony recently went viral online and the authorities looked into the incident.
The education department also said on its Weibo microblog account that it ordered the kindergarten to conduct “profound self-criticism and apologise to the public”.
The kindergarten’s principal, Xia Miao, has since apologised through a written statement, which was posted on the Zhabei education department’s Weibo.
Xia explained that a head teacher of one class found the Warship March while searching online for drumming performance music and, thinking it was just an ordinary marching song, mistakenly used it for the graduation of that class.
"As the principal, I feel very guilty. I deeply apologise to internet users and the public and [I am] willing to be responsible for the incident,” said Xia.
"The head teacher, only considering the rhythm, failed to recognise the content and source of the music, which did not have lyrics or any other language suggestions,” Xiao said in the apology.
Xia said the video going viral had a “big negative impact”, and the incident resulted from the negligence of the head teacher and directors at the kindergarten, whom the principal described as “not politically sensitive enough”.
Xiao added that the kindergarten learned a “profound lesson” from the incident and would make sure similar incidents would not happen again.
The Zhabei education department, meanwhile, said it held an emergency meeting urging all schools to reinforce Chinese patriotic education, and to standardise the use of music and videos in schools, as well as improve all cadres and teachers’ political awareness.
The Warship March, also known as the Gunkan March, was composed in 1897, and during the second world war was used prior to battle. China and Japan have fought in two wars, in 1894-95 and 1937-45.
War history is a touchy issue between the two countries, which have had disputes over historical facts, particularly over the Japanese military's conduct in China. 
Recent tensions flared to a new high when Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe infuriated China and other countries by visiting the Yasukuni Shrine in December, where convicted war criminals are honoured.
The relations between the two countries have been further strained in recent years due to a territorial dispute over islands in the East China Sea called the Diaoyus in Chinese (Senkakus in Japanese).
Abe’s subsequent proposal to revise Japan’s post-war pacifist constitution and move towards militarism further complicated relations, which were already fraught by the islands dispute.
Japan, in turn, saw China’s declaration of an air defence zone that covered the Diaoyus, and repeated deployment of ships and aircraft around the disputed islets as a threat to national security.


Shanghai kindergarten punished for playing Japanese war song at graduation

Kindergarten children dressed in military uniforms carry toy guns at a park in Dongyang, Zhejiang province as part of patriotic education lessons. Photo: Reuters

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China

School suspends officials and apologises after teacher mistakenly used battle march at ceremony


Education authorities in Shanghai have punished a kindergarten teacher and its principal after a Japanese wartime march song was played at its graduation ceremony.


Shanghai kindergarten punished for playing Japanese war song at graduation

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}School suspends officials and apologises after teacher mistakenly used battle march at ceremony

School suspends officials and apologises after teacher mistakenly used battle march at ceremony