The school board in the Japanese city of Matsue has restricted student access to Keiji Nakazawa's Barefoot Gen, the autobiographical story of a six-year-old boy who survived the Hiroshima bombing.

The board ruled that the book will remain in elementary and junior high school libraries but only teachers will have access to it; students will not be allowed to check it out.

Barefoot Gen, which originally ran in Shonen Jump, a magazine for teenage boys, is based on Nakazawa's own experiences; he was seven years old and on his way to school when the bomb was dropped, and the adult who was walking with him was burned to death on the spot, and his father, brother and sister were killed when their burning house collapsed on them.

The Matsue school board made its decision last December, after a complaint was filed with them alleging "Children would gain a wrong perception of history because the work describes atrocities by Japanese troops that did not take place." Many Japanese nationalists deny that Japanese troops were involved in the Rape of Nanking or committed war crimes during World War II, such as the events depicted in the book. Nonetheless, the school board said its decision was based strictly on the level of violence in the books and not on the political nature of the complaint.

Barefoot Gen has been acclaimed worldwide, and it is included in the Hiroshima Public Schools' peace education curriculum for elementary school students, although there have been calls for it to be removed from schools there as well.