Скачать или смотреть Japanese politicians in wild brawl inside parliament during pacifist debate Video

Japanese MPs have engaged in wild scuffles inside parliament during a heated debate over expanding the pacifist nation’s military presence.

Video from inside the parliament yesterday in Tokyo showed government and opposition MPs swarm around a committee chairman as he held a controversial bill which proposes to increase the role of Japan’s military.

Politicians scrambled over seating and shoved their rivals as they surrounded the chairman’s desk in an attempt to stop him calling a vote.

Government MPs formed a protective circle around the committeeman and allowed him to formally announce the ballot, despite his microphone being torn from his grasp.

The bills were eventually passed in the lower house and will be voted on in the upper house this week.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe stayed bizarrely calm during the chaos and sat peacefully with his eyes closed before he walked out of the chamber.

The bill would see the nation’s military be allowed to join its allies – such as the US – in foreign conflicts in which Japan was not directly threatened.

The proposal has been criticised in pacifist Japan, which since WWII has chosen to use its military only for self-defence.

An estimated 13,000 protesters campaigned outside the parliament over the plan, which has been deeply unpopular with voters and described as unconstitutional.