By Clint Richards
Civil society and a fractured opposition are unable to influence the government’s new power.
The Cabinet of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe decided on Tuesday to approve the guidelines for the state secrecy law, which was passed last December. The law, which will take effect on December 10, allows the government to designate information as a state secret under four broad categories: foreign affairs, defense, counter-espionage and counter-terrorism. The law is controversial among Japanese media and civil society, although perhaps not as much as the Cabinet’s decision to reinterpret the Constitution’s stance on collective self-defense. However, it is yet another example of legislation that the ruling LDP has managed to carry through the Diet relatively uncontested, as Japan’s opposition parties remain weak, fractured, and hopelessly outnumbered.
State secrets will be designated by the heads of 19 different agencies and ministries encompassing a wide range of government functions, including the Nuclear Regulation Authority, the Defense Ministry, and the Cabinet Secretariat. Additionally, these government heads will be able to identify state secrets among 55 different categories: from the development of military hardware to information shared through almost any medium by the national and foreign governments, as well as international organizations. The penalty for divulging state secrets will be a 10-year sentence for public officials, and five years for journalists.
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