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TOKYO - Two-month-old Prince Hisahito, the first boy to be born into Japan's royal family in more than 40 years, was presented at a Shinto shrine in the imperial palace grounds on Tuesday in a traditional ceremony for royal babies.
Princess Kiko, the 40-year-old wife of Emperor Akihito's second son, Prince Akishino, gave birth to Hisahito in September, to the joy of conservatives anxious to preserve the custom of male-only succession in the royal family.
No boys had been born into the household since Akishino in 1965 and an advisory panel to former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi had recommended changing the law to allow females and their children to accede to the throne, in order to avoid a succession crisis.
Current Prime Minister Shinzo Abe opposes any such change.
Dressed all in white, Hisahito was brought from the quarters he shares with his parents and two elder sisters to a shrine on the grounds of the imperial palace, a palace official said.
He was later taken to visit his grandparents, the emperor and empress.
"We call him Yu-chan," Akishino told reporters at the entrance to his residence, Kyodo news reported. 'Yu' is an alternative reading of the first of the two characters that make up the baby's name.
"This is a ceremony similar to the shrine visits carried out by other families," the palace spokesman said. "It is not limited to heirs to the throne."
Hisahito is third in line to the throne after Crown Prince Naruhito and Akishino. A change in the law to allow women to inherit the throne could have made Naruhito's only child, 4-year-old Princess Aiko, Japan's first reigning empress since the 18th century.
Aiko's mother, former diplomat Crown Princess Masako, is being treated for a mental disorder caused by the stress of adapting to royal life and, commentators say, the pressure to bear a male heir.
Japanese infants are often presented at Shinto shrines shortly after birth, then periodically during childhood. Shinto, a form of animism, is Japan's native religion.
- REUTERS
