Man burns himself in Tokyo against collective defense

TOKYO - A man burned himself at the crowded Shinjuku train station in Japan's capital Tokyo on Sunday in a move allegedly to protest against the Japanese government's attempt to exercise the rights to collective self-defense, according to social media Twitter.

The man, according to pictures, was in his 50s and reportedly had a speech opposing Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's administration and its efforts to lift the country's self-imposed ban on collective self-defense rights before burning himself on a bridge connecting buildings at around 2:00 pm local time.

Local police has blocked the site and declined to provide details to Xinhua through a telephone interview, and the man's condition after the suicidal attempt remains unknown.

The incident came after the Japanese government on Friday submitted the final version of the resolutions of exercising the defense rights to the ruling coalition.

The Abe administration plans to approve the resolutions on July 1 at the earliest date if the ruling bloc gives green light to the final version.

The collective self-defense rights allow the Japanese Self- Defense Forces (SDF) engage battles overseas, which run contrary against Japan's war-renouncing pacifist constitution which bans the SDF to combat outside Japan.

According to the latest survey on the controversial issue by Japan's Asahi Shimbun, about 67 percent of Japanese opposed lifting the ban through constitution reinterpretation and 56 percent of Japanese oppose relaxing the ban through any means.