LONDON – Japan’s imperial couple “felt a sense of unease” about their links to the British royal family ahead of their state visit in 1998, newly released documents at the National Archives in London showed Saturday.
The files opened to public view show that, despite their past visits, then Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko felt they lacked the more intimate connections enjoyed by other members of the imperial family with Britain and its royal family.
Akihito acceded to the throne in January 1989 and abdicated in April 2019.
Sadaaki Numata, a minister at the Japanese Embassy in London at the time, spoke to David Wright, then one of the most senior civil servants at the Foreign Office, to air the imperial couple’s concerns and sought to strengthen connections, according to the telegram Wright sent to the British ambassador in Japan in 1994.
Wright wrote to then Ambassador John Boyd and then Foreign Secretary Douglas Hurd’s private secretary, John Sawers, with a view to raising the matter at the ministerial level.
Wright wrote, “He (Numata) identified one problem about the Emperor and Empress. They felt a sense of unease about their links with the British Crown.”
“They lacked the firm foundation of the long-standing personal links” of other imperial members such as Akihito’s aunt Princess Chichibu, and younger brother Prince Hitachi and his wife Princess Hanako, Wright said in the telegram.
“In a sense, and to make matters worse, their lack of close personal ties was highlighted by the experience of the next generation,” Wright wrote.
Wright’s telegram refers to Akihito’s son, Emperor Naruhito, who studied at Oxford University between 1983 and 1985, as did his wife, Empress Masako.
Akihito’s younger son, Crown Prince Fumihito, and his cousin-in-law, Princess Hisako, had built ties with the British royal family while they attended Cambridge University and Oxford, respectively.
“The successful British ties of the younger generation served to enhance TIHS’s (Their Imperial Highnesses’) sense of unease about the lack of a close relationship with the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh,” Wright wrote.
Although Akihito attended Queen Elizabeth’s coronation in 1953 when he was crown prince and stayed at Windsor Castle with his wife in 1976, other members of the imperial family had lived in Britain and built more durable ties with the British royal family.
Numata told Wright he felt the royal couple’s ties to the British royal household were weaker than in the 1980s when their two princes studied in Britain.
Despite a Japanese state visit to Britain being considered for several years, it was only in 1998 that it actually took place as it was considered controversial by some in Britain due to the history of the two countries fighting in World War II and former prisoners of war demanding apology and compensation.
