japs happy CNY angbao

boy in blues SG

the Japanese people represented by their ruling government wishes Chinese people all over the world a happy chinese new year with this gift. next they will invade the isalnd, followed by Taiwan, Korea and then China.

source : http://www.channelnewsasia.com/cgi-bin/search/search_7days.pl?status=&search=diaoyu&id=131663
TOKYO : Japan said it had placed under state control a lighthouse built by nationalists on a disputed island in the East China Sea despite rival claims by China and Taiwan.

The 5.6-meter (18-foot) lighthouse was erected in 1988 by Japanese right-wing activists to mark a claim on Uotsuri-jima, the largest of the Senkaku Islands, known as Diaoyu in China, which lie between Taiwan and Japan.

"Those who built the lighthouse said they no longer can run it," Vice Foreign Minister Shuzen Tanigawa said.

"Since they have abandoned the right of possession, it has been transferred" to the state, Tanigawa said.

"Japan has been saying they (the islands) are traditional Japanese territory," he said. "Even if we have some trouble, we are going to protect what we have to protect."

The move comes amid rising tensions between Japan and China, including a dispute over a major gas field near the islands where a Chinese nuclear submarine intruded in November setting off a two-day chase.

Tokyo has already informed Beijing of the transfer of lighthouse authority, Tanigawa said, adding that it had yet to receive any reaction from the Chinese side.

Japan, like most countries, has no diplomatic relations with Taiwan.

Japan declared the oil-rich but uninhabited islands were part of its territory in 1895, the same year it took over Taiwan.

The tiny islands were under control of the United States, which used them for military drills, until 1972 when they were returned to Japan together with Okinawa.

In the early 1970s China and Taiwan made claims to the islands after oil deposits were confirmed in the area by a United Nations agency.

In March, Japanese authorities arrested and deported seven Chinese activists after they went to the islands, causing a diplomatic row with Beijing.

The activists were the first people to land on the disputed islands since 1996.

Relations between Japan and China have been increasingly strained in recent months in part over disputes about the nearby gas field where Beijing began drilling in 2003 despite Tokyo's protests.

In December, Japan for the first time listed China as a potential threat in revised defense guidelines.

China, in turn, has been incensed over Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's repeated annual visits to Yasukuni shrine, which honors Japanese war dead including war criminals in a bitter reminder of Japan's militaristic past.

China has refused all bilateral state visits due to Koizumi's pilgrimages. The Japanese premier has defended his visits but has not gone to the shrine this year. - AFP

boy in blues SG

source : http://www.channelnewsasia.com/cgi-bin/search/search_7days.pl?status=&search=diaoyu&id=131783
BEIJING: China said Wednesday any unilateral move by Japan on a group of disputed islands was "illegal and invalid."

It was reacting to news that the Tokyo government had taken over a lighthouse built by Japanese nationalists on the islands.

" Diaoyu Island and adjacent islands are intrinsic parts of Chinese territory," Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Kong Quan said in a statement.

"Any unilateral move by Japan is illegal and invalid."

Japan said earlier in the day it had placed under state control and protection a lighthouse erected on the largest of the Diaoyu islands in the East China Sea. China and Taiwan also claim the islands.

The 5.6-metre (18-foot) lighthouse was erected in 1988 by Japanese right-wing activists to mark a claim to the island.

The move comes amid rising tensions between Japan and China, including a dispute over a major gasfield near the islands where a Chinese nuclear submarine intruded in November, setting off a two-day chase. - AFP

boy in blues SG

China-Japan frictions moving to military field
(People's Daily)
Updated: 2005-01-23 15:59

The year 2005 has just begun and the differences between the two neighboring countries - China and Japan, instead of shrinking, are showing a dangerous sign of gradually moving frictions to the military field.

According to inside information disclosed by the Japanese Kyodo News Agency Japan Defense Agency has enacted specific action plan to defend the southwest islands. The plan decided that when something happened in the southwest islands apart from sending fighter planes and destroyers the Japan Defense Agency would dispatch as many as 55,000 soldiers of the Ground Self Defense Forces and special forces there. The so-called southwest islands mentioned in the guideline also include China's Diaoyu Island.

Officials with the Japan Defense Agency said most of the southwest islands have no troops stationed there and are blank areas in terms of territory defense. The Chinese navy keeps expanding activity scope. The SDF needs to pay attention to its future movement. The target of what he said is quite obvious.

This provocation on the part of Japan directly incensed China. Chinese FM spokesman Kong Quan said on January 18 that the Diaoyu Island and its affiliated islands have been China's territory since the ancient times. Japan has different opinions in this regard. China always holds that China and Japan should solve relevant disputes through negotiations and consultations rather than take any unilateral actions.

By comparison China's attitude is more restrained.

Over the year Japan has on the one hand disseminated the "China military threat theory" and on the other embodied this theory in its official documents. In November, 2004 the Japan Defense Agency put up the show of revealing "three possibilities of China's attack on Japan". On December 7, 2004 Japanese PM Assistant Yoriko Kawaguchi, who was attending the Meeting of European Security Cooperation Organizations, tried to dissuade the EU from lifting China arms embargo. The Japanese Defense White Paper 2004 and the report of the Security Safeguard and Defense Strength Conference" published in November, 2004 all preached the "China military threat theory". On December 10, 2004 the Japanese cabinet passed a new Defense Plan Outline, which apart from singing the old tune of "DPRK threat theory" puts the "China military threat theory" into this official government security policy document for the first time.

In 2004 Japan sped up the pace toward a military power of "Japan-US integration" and "overseas intervention" in such aspects as security strategy, relevant systems and armament etc. International public opinion believes that Japan resorts to the strategy of "a thief crying 'stop thief'" and try to fan the "China military threat theory" to clear public opinion obstacles both at home and abroad.

In such an atmosphere the China-Japan security mutual trust fell even lower. The "security dilemma" of being mutually guarded has not been eased. PM Junichiro Koizumi's visit to the Yasukuni Shrine again killed the mutual visits by fleets of the two countries. Military exchange was in a stagnant state.

Jin Xide, a research fellow at the Japan Institute of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said "enhancing mutual trust" would be an import subject in China-Japan relations in 2005. In the new year the possibility that China and Japan make breakthrough in the security area is rather low.

In 2005 the competent departments of the Chinese and Japanese governments would continue to carry out dialogues and negotiations centered on mutual differences and cooperation. These questions involve wide areas such as the demarcation of the East China Sea and oil gas field exploitation as well as economics and trade, technology, energy and environmental protection etc. The defense departments of the two countries would continue to launch security dialogues and military exchanges at various levels. Due to the high sensitivity of these areas this kind of dialogues would be influenced and limited by the China-Japan political relations. On the other hand, the possibility whether a stable security dialogue and military exchange system relatively independent of the political frictions between the two countries can be established has been listed into agenda as an important way of thinking.

In recent years the thought of mutual visits by Chinese and Japanese fleets has long attracted attention as an important link to expand military exchange and enhance security mutual trust. In 2005 if the question of PM Junichiro Koizumi's visit to the Yasukuni Shrine is solved appropriately, political atmosphere surrounding the two countries thaws and warms up, public opinions of China and Japan grows relaxed, this projection may resurface. However, the Liberal Democratic Party - the governing party in Japan adopted a new policy guideline on Jan. 18, which proclaimed support of PM Junichiro Koizumi's visit to the Yasukuni Shrine. This made observers of the China-Japan relations even more nervous.

The Japanese economy sank into a long depression after 1991 whilst China entered an economic blast-off in the 1990s. Meanwhile the intension of the Japanese decision-making body to break through the "peace constitution" drawing on "pressure" from the US is growing increasingly clear. Its will to become a political power and a military power has grown stronger. Under the influence of these factors competition between China and Japan and their watchful mentality form a vicious circle.

On the question of history the Japanese right-wring conservative forces keep instigating incidents to reverse the history of Japan's invasion of China. China is forced to make restrained response after long forbearance. All the facts prove that the one who is "holding tight to the historical question" is Japan, not China.

Military disputes repeat the routine of the historical question. Japan keeps instigating incidents and China is forced to respond. The military tone of Japan's China policy is becoming increasingly thicker. Japan's China diplomacy is growing "aggressive".

Today's Japanese decision-making body is deviating from the peaceful development course based on reflecting on defeated war experience and is attempting to revive the "past power and prestige" backed by might. For Japan a stable external environment built by means of good neighborhood diplomacy and peace should be a less costly and more efficient way. To choose a way of befriending distant states while attacking those nearby would not necessarily bring about Japan's increased security. Moreover, if even the neighboring countries refuse support how is it possible for Japan to fulfill its "political power dream"?

Recently some people in China, failing to truly understand Japan's political intention and means, have claimed to want to "find solution for the China-Japan relations". But the prescription they wrote was so crude as to say that China should make a comprehensive concession toward Japan! The Japanese have made complete study of some Chinese's psychological weaknesses and have become tough even on questions whose nature is so clear as visits to the Yasukuni Shrine.

Jin Xide believes that we should have a clear understanding and accept the reality that the China-Japan "chilly politics" cannot be completely avoided, and make better mental preparation for the fluctuation of the China-Japan political relations, give up the illusion of making unilateral concession so as to exchange for a "hot-politics" situation. This way will be more conducive to calmer and rational handling of the China-Japan political frictions and steady advance of the China-Japan relations.

boy in blues SG

Japan Cannot Add Chinese Territory into Its Military Plan

The latest release of a set of Japan's detailed emergency military programs against China on the issue of the Diaoyu Islands has put Tokyo's sincerity in doubt, having said on many occasions how much it values peace and friendship with China and having vowed not to go to war with its neighbors again.

Japan's Defense Agency has mapped out a plan on how to repel possible foreign invasions against a group of its remote southern islands, which include China's Diaoyu Islands, the country's Kyodo News Agency said on Saturday.

The plan, which was first released in November, calls for steps such as the dispatch of navy destroyers, submarines and fighter planes as well as the deployment of a 55,000-personnel special and rapid response unit when there are signs that foreign troops are launching attacks against the remote islands off Kyushu and Okinawa.

The ruse for the arrangement is that the Self-Defense Forces do not have troops stationed on most of the southern islands, which turns out to be a vacuum in terms of security.

According to the military program, Japan's patrol planes of the Maritime Self-Defense Forces (MSDFs) and the airborne warning and control system of the Air Self-Defense Forces would remain on active service around the remote islands to collect information. Its fighters, submarines and destroyers dispatched from the Kyushu and Chugoku regions would be divided into two groups to prevent aggressors from landing on the islands or blocking their supply routes.

The Ground Self-Defense Forces would mobilize its Western Army Infantry Regiment and members of the newly established central rapid response forces to recapture invaded islands if the MSDFs fail to prevent foreign aggressors from landing.

Every country has the right to remain on high alert against possible foreign intrusions and brace itself for safeguarding its country's sovereignty and territorial integrity.

This time, Japan has put a piece of land, which has belonged to China for centuries, in its own basket.

The Diaoyu Islands, called the Senkakus in Japan, has been part of China's territory since ancient times.

Thus, when drawing up concrete steps to keep these islands from being invaded, what the Japanese military department is trying to do is how it is preparing itself to prevent foreign troops from occupying foreign territories.

Also, through describing a terrible picture of "its territory" being invaded, the Japanese military has made an obvious attempt to upgrade its already sophisticated arms stockpile and expand its military self-defense scope beyond what its postwar Pacific Constitution stipulates.

When it describes how it will fortify the Diaoyu Islands and how it will prevent and defeat possible aggression by Chinese troops into the islands, Tokyo not only shows its aggression to the Chinese people, but also defies its past claims that settlement of any disputes will take place with its neighbor through consultation.

This is only one episode of a series of similar behavior by the Japanese.

Late last year, the Japanese Defense Agency drew up three scenarios of Chinese invasions of Japan.

The presumptions have turned Japan's claim that it values friendship with China pale.

Tokyo's actions involving neighbors have clearly indicated what kind of policy it really holds towards them.

(China Daily January 18, 2005)