(LEAD) S. Korean man gets 4-year jail term for Yasukuni bombing

(ATTN: UPDATES with comment from Chon's mother in para 6)

TOKYO, July 19 (Yonhap) -- A Tokyo court handed down a four-year jail term to a South Korean man Tuesday for detonating a bomb in a public restroom at a controversial Tokyo war shrine last year, according to media reports.

The Tokyo District Court found the 28-year-old suspect, identified only by his surname Chon, guilty of breaking into the premises of the Yasukuni Shrine on Nov. 23 and setting up the bomb in the public restroom, Kyodo News said.

He was arrested in December shortly after voluntarily returning to Tokyo by plane.

Chon's legal representative has been demanding a suspended sentence, while admitting to the wrongdoings.

Prosecutors had originally sought a five-year sentence.

The defendant's 55-year-old mother said they will appeal the ruling.

South Korea and China view the Yasukuni Shrine -- which honors over 2.4 million war dead, including 14 convicted Class-A war criminals -- as a symbol of Japan's past imperialism.

Many South Koreans still harbor deep resentment against Japan over its 1910-45 colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula.

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