Japanese Prime Minister Ishiba Shigeru has sent a ritual offering to Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo to mark the start of its spring festival on Monday.



Ishiba gave the shrine a potted plant known as "masakaki" with a wooden plaque bearing his name and his title of prime minister.



Ishiba also made an offering during the shrine' autumn festival last year, in line with the precedent set by his predecessors, including Kishida Fumio and Suga Yoshihide.



Sources say Ishiba will not visit the shrine during the three-day spring festival.



Two other members of his cabinet, Health, Labor and Welfare Minister Fukuoka Takamaro and Economic Security Minister Kiuchi Minoru have also made ritual offerings to the shrine.



Yasukuni Shrine honors Japan's war dead. Chinese and South Korean leaders have criticized their Japanese counterparts for visiting the shrine. They are angry that those remembered include military and political leaders convicted of war crimes after World War Two.