China called for Japan on Wednesday to "honestly" deal with its history of aggression during World War II as Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is preparing for a speech marking the 70th anniversary of Tokyo's surrender in the war.
  

China's foreign ministry spokeswoman Hong Lei made the comments as a 16-member panel appointed by Abe held its first meeting in Tokyo earlier in the day to discuss the speech that is expected to be announced on the Aug. 15 anniversary of Japan's surrender.
  

The much-anticipated speech by Abe will be closely watched by Japan's neighbors amid speculation that Tokyo might tone down its past apologies to wartime atrocities.
  

"We hope that Japan, on this special occasion, can show an attitude that honestly reflects upon its history and win back the trust of its Asian neighbors and the international community," Hong told a regular press briefing.
  

Abe has angered both South Korea and China by making a controversial visit to the Yasukuni shrine, which honors 14 Class A Japanese criminals convicted by the Allies in the trials that followed the war, in December 2013.
  

Abe's cabinet had also suggested that it could review a landmark 1993 apology for the Japanese Imperial Army's sexual slavery of women during the war.
  

According to historians, up to 200,000 women, mostly Korean, were coerced into sexual servitude at front-line Japanese brothels during the war when the Korean Peninsula was a Japanese colony. Those sex slaves were euphemistically described by the Japanese military as "comfort women."
  

Earlier this month, a group of American history scholars expressed strong protest against Japan's attempts to pressure a textbook publisher to change the description of Japan's wartime sex slavery.
  

The protest by American scholars came after Japan asked U.S. publisher McGraw-Hill to alter the description of the sexual slavery issue in one of its textbooks. (Yonhap)