Keyakizaka46, a popular Japanese all-girls band, has come under fire for performing on stage in outfits resembling Nazi-era German military uniforms.
The band went on stage at an October 22 concert wearing black knee-length dresses that look like military overcoats, and black capes and officer caps with a Nazi-like eagle emblem.
Sony Music Japan, the group’s label, apologized Tuesday after the incident.
“We express our heartfelt apology for causing offense … because of our lack of understanding,” Sony Music Japan said in a statement posted on its website. “We take the incident seriously and will make efforts to prevent a recurrence of a similar incident in the future.”
Sony Music spokesman Yasuyuki Oshio said there had been no intention to link the performance to Nazism.
The Simon Wiesenthal Center, which educates the public about the holocaust and combats anti-Semitism internationally, issued a statement Monday saying it was disgusted by the uniforms and called on Sony Music and the group’s producer to apologize.
“Watching young teens on the stage and in the audience dancing in Nazi-style uniforms causes great distress to the victims of the Nazi genocide,” Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the Wiesenthal Center, said in the statement.
By: World Israel News Staff
AP contributed to this report.