‘The horror of war should never be repeated. I would like to express this vow for the future and the value of reconciliation [between Japan and the United States] together with US President Obama,’ Abe Abe told reporters before flying to Hawaii.
The two leaders will hold talks on Tuesday before visiting the USS Arizona Memorial, a sweeping white structure suspended over the sunken remains of a ship destroyed during the attack.
Abe will not apologize for the December 7, 1941 surprise attack, which killed 2,403 Americans and prompted the United States to enter World War II, Japanese government officials said.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga confirmed Monday that two more Japanese prime ministers visited Pearl Harbor though Tokyo had initially said Abe would be the first sitting premier to do so.
Suga also confirmed earlier this month that prime minister Shigeru Yoshida had also made a trip to the site in 1951.
In May, Obama became the first incumbent US president to visit the Japanese city of Hiroshima, the site of the first of two US atomic bombings in the final days of World War II.
But the president did not offer an apology for the nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which killed hundreds of thousands of civilians.
Tuesday's meeting will come less than a month before Donald Trump is inaugurated as US president on January 20.
