Justin Bieber apologises for visiting Tokyo's Yasukuni Shrine

Tokyo: Justin Bieber said sorry and insisted he loved Japan and China after he stepped into a bitter fight over history by visiting a controversial war shrine in Tokyo.

The troubled Canadian pop prince posted a snap of him at Yasakuni shrine on his Instagram account — tweeting the link to his 51 million Twitter followers — with the message “Thank you for your blessings”.

The shrine is seen across Asia as a symbol of Japan’s perceived lack of penitence for its imperialist past.

An attached museum peddles a view of World War II deemed unpalatable by most mainstream historians, casting Japan as a victim and a frustrated liberator of the Asian continent.