TOKYO (AP) — Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe sent a religious offering Monday to a Tokyo shrine that honors the dead, including executed war criminals — long a source of tension with Japan’s neighbors China and South Korea.

Abe’s offering at the Yasukuni Shrine marks the April 21-23 spring festival, one of the shrine’s key annual events. But the move suggests he will not go to Yasukuni ahead of President Barack Obama’s visit beginning Wednesday.