(AFP) Japan came under fire again on the 56th anniversary of its surrender in World War II as ethnic Chinese community today demanded a public apology for wartime atrocities.

Mourners at a war memorial in Kuala Lumpur also protested Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's visit to a war shrine and the approval of a school history book said to gloss over the nation's wartime record.

MCA Youth chairman and deputy Youth and Sports minister Ong Tee Keat urged the Japanese government to "show they are committed to maintaining peace in the region by disassociating itself from its militarist past".