Information AboutTaro Aso |
| CATEGORIES ABOUT TARO ASO | |
| 1940 births | |
| government ministers of japan | |
| japanese politicians | |
| people from fukuoka prefecture | |
| roman catholic politicians | |
| living people | |
| olympic shooters of japan | |
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Taro Aso (麻生太郎 ''Asō Tarō'', born September 20 , 1940 ) is a Japanese politician currently serving as Minister For Foreign Affairs . Aso and Chief Cabinet Secretary Shinzo Abe are considered leading candidates to replace Koizumi after the prime minister's term expires. Both are conservative on foreign policy issues and have taken confrontational stances toward other East Asian nations, particularly North Korea and, to a lesser extent, China . Abe is considered a more "moderate" politician than the more "hard-line" Aso, and has led Aso in opinion polling within Japan. {Link without Title} EARLY LIFE Aso was born in Iizuka, Fukuoka . His father, Takakichi Aso, was chairman of the Aso Cement Company and a close associate of Prime Minister Kakuei Tanaka ; his mother was Prime Minister Shigeru Yoshida 's daughter. Aso is also a great-great-grandson of Toshimichi Okubo , and his wife is the third daughter of Prime Minister Zenko Suzuki . He graduated from the Faculty of Politics and Economics at before civil war forced him to return to Japan. Aso entered his father's company in 1966, and served as president from 1973 to 1979. He was also a member of the Japanese Shooting team at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal . POLITICAL CAREER Aso was elected as a member of the House Of Representatives in October 1979 , and has since been re-elected eight times. In 1988 he became Parliamentary Vice Minister for Education. He joined the Cabinet of Junichiro Koizumi in 2003 as Minister of Internal Affairs, Posts and Communications. On October 31, 2005, he became Minister for Foreign Affairs. There has been some speculation that his position in the Cabinet is due to his membership in the Kono Group, an LDP caucus led by pro-Chinese lawmaker Yohei Kono . By appointing Aso as Minister for Foreign Affairs, Koizumi may be attempting to "rein in" Kono's statements critical of Japanese foreign policy. {Link without Title} Controversial statements At a meeting of the Kono Group in 2001 , Aso drew criticism when he said that "those '' Burakumin '' can't become prime minister," a statement directed at Hiromu Nonaka , a ''burakumin'' member of the Diet. Aso's office attempted to clarify the statements by saying that they were misunderstood. In May of 2003 , while attending a festival at the University Of Tokyo , Aso remarked that Koreans wanted to change their names to Japanese names during colonial rule, and that Japan helped in the diffusion of the Hangul writing system. Later in 2003, when Abe was inaugurated as Minister of Internal Affairs, Posts and Communications, he predicted that Information Technology developments would lead to a future in which paper was replaced by "floppies." On October 15 , 2005 , he praised Japan for having "''one nation, one civilization, one language, one culture and one race,''" and stated that it was the only such country in the world. [http://www.japantoday.com/e/?content=news&cat=1&id=352312 On '') {Link without Title} On January 28 , 2006 , he called for the emperor to visit the controversial Yasukuni shrine. He later backtracked on the comment, but stated that he hoped such a visit would be possible in the future. {Link without Title} Kyodo News reported that he had said on February 4 , 2006 "our predecessors did a good thing" regarding Compulsory Education implemented during Japan's colonization of Taiwan . {Link without Title} ) that the Beijing rather than Taipei government be considered the sole legal government of China and that Taiwan be considered "an inalienable part of the territory of the People's Republic of China." EXTERNAL LINKS |
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