Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe sent a ritual offering to the Yasukuni Shrine, a war shrine considered a symbol of Japan's imperialistic past.

According to Japan's Kyodo News on Tuesday, Abe sent the offering in the form of a ritual tree, marking the shrine's annual spring festival.

Since visiting the war shrine in late 2013 after returning to power the previous year, Abe has been making offerings regularly for the shrine's spring and fall festivals, as well as on August 15 which marks the country's 1945 surrender in World War Two.

Amid a heightened state of emergency due to the novel coronavirus pandemic, a cross-party group of conservative lawmakers has decided not to visit the shrine during the festival, the first time since its formation in 1981.

Yasukuni Shrine honors nearly two-point-five million war dead, including 14 Class-A war criminals, and visits by Japanese political leaders have drawn sharp criticism from neighboring countries, including South Korea.