Who'll be Japan's conscience-keeper after Akihito abdicates in April?

Living in anguish in his final years, late Japanese Emperor Hirohito was haunted by talks holding him responsible for Japan's war with China (and other countries) before and during World War II, as his close aide Shinobu Kobayashi wrote in his diary.

Kobayashi's diary entry, dated April 7, 1987, quotes Hirohito, 83, as saying a longer life would only "increase my chances of seeing or hearing things that are agonizing".

Another Hirohito chamberlain, Ryogo Urabe, wrote in his diary that the emperor wanted to convey his regret over the Sino-Japanese War to the visiting Chinese premier Hua Guofeng in May 1980. But senior officials of the Imperial Household Agency opposed Hirohito's idea for fear of a backlash from rightists in Japan.