Kerry was part of a delegation of foreign ministers at a two-day meeting of the Group of Seven bloc of nations. Ahead of the visit, it was made clear that the U.S. secretary of state would not be specifically apologizing for the destruction of these two cities, which led to the end of World War II. Rather, both senior U.S. and Japanese officials emphasized the need to look not to the past, but to the future.

The G-7 ministers issued a joint declaration that said their countries "share the deep desire of the people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki that nuclear weapons never be used again."

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China, though, seemed unmoved, revealing a degree of wariness and cynicism about the bonhomie among Japan and leading Western powers.

An editorial in Xinhua, China's state news agency, poured scorn on the solemn meeting in Hiroshima. The horrors of the bombing, it noted, "should serve as a reminder that the reflection on the tragedy should focus more on its root cause than Japan's much-trumpeted victimhood."

It went on to lambaste "Japan's militaristic aggression" and legacy of "brutal violence" during World War II, when the country occupied a vast swath of Asia and provoked the United States into joining the global conflict with the assault on Pearl Harbor in 1941.

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In the past year, the governments in Beijing and Seoul have been dismayed at Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's refusal to fully apologize for Japan's war crimes.

"I bow my head deeply before the souls of all those who perished both at home and abroad. I express my feelings of profound grief and my eternal, sincere condolences,” Abe said in a speech last year marking the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II. But he added: "We must not let our children, grandchildren, and even further generations to come, who have nothing to do with that war, be predestined to apologize."

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The Xinhua editorial insisted that "it is Tokyo's lasting moral obligation to let that notorious chapter known by every citizen of the country and make compensations and apologies fair and square to the affected individuals and facilities, not just in Japan but also in other stricken nations."

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It went on to accuse both the United States and Japan of escalating "the simmering tension in the region" by reprimanding North Korea in the G-7 Hiroshima declaration, which condemned in "the strongest terms" North Korea's "continued development of its nuclear and ballistic missile programs."

This sort of censure is apparently unwelcome in Beijing, and the Xinhua editorial inveighed against a supposed larger history of Western provocations.

"Speaking from a broader spectrum, the current Korean deadlock is the bitter legacy of decades of the West's distrust, animosity and confrontation wrought by its ingrained Cold War mentality," the editorial said. "It is no coincidence that most of the world's current hotspots and disturbances should be attributed to the West's biased policies."

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The Japanese government itself is not particularly keen on soliciting a U.S. apology for Hiroshima, but the arrival of the G-7 foreign ministers in the city has been considered a diplomatic victory for Tokyo. Attention now switches to a potential visit from President Obama, which would be the first such trip by a sitting U.S. president.

This post has been updated.