China calls on Japan to shun bloc confrontation, sensitive issues like Taiwan

China and Japan should not provoke each other’s core interests, Chinese foreign minister tells event marking 50th year since ties were normalised
Ties have been tested in recent years over Tokyo’s tilt to key ally the United States and a tendency to side with Taiwan on cross-strait issues

Taiwan

Zhenzhen Liu

Published: 8:00pm, 7 Dec 2022

Why you can trust SCMP

China has called on Japan to beware of the “zero-sum game trap” and not join any bloc confrontations targeting Beijing, but rather work together to tackle global challenges.

Addressing an event to mark half a century since the normalisation of ties, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said: “China and Japan should treat each other with sincerity and strive to live together peacefully”, rather than provoke each other’s core interests, including “heavily sensitive issues involving history and Taiwan”.

“The differences that exist between the two sides should be properly dealt with in accordance with the existing consensus, and more new consensus should be constantly sought,” Wang said in his virtual address to the event in Tokyo.

This year marks the 50th anniversary of a joint communique normalising diplomatic ties between the Asian neighbours, with the 45th year of the China-Japan Treaty of Peace and Friendship coming up in 2023.

This is an opportunity “to push China-Japan relations forward in the right direction in a sustained and stable manner”, Wang said.

China-Japan relations have long been strained by their wartime history and territorial disputes in the East China Sea.

The joint communique of September 1972, which pledged “perpetual peace and friendship”, saw Tokyo sever ties with self-governed Taiwan to recognise Beijing as the “sole legal government” of China.

00:59

US President Joe Biden meets Japan’s Emperor Naruhito to discuss counter-China strategy

But Japan has in recent years shown a tendency to lean more towards the United States – a key ally and fellow Group of 7 member – against what is seen as China’s growing military assertiveness in the region. Tokyo has also drawn closer to Taiwan in the US-China tussle over cross-strait issues.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on Monday announced plans to increase military spending by 50 per cent within the next five years, with Defence Minister Yasukazu Hamada citing the need to “firmly secure the necessities to pursue substantial reinforcement”.

Beijing called the boost “highly dangerous”, warning it was certain to “put Asian neighbours and the international community on high alert about Japan’s commitment to an exclusively defensive policy and to peaceful development”.

Wang in his speech also urged Japan to promote economic and trade cooperation, which is “essentially mutually beneficial” for both countries, and implement the principle of “not posing threats to each other” in policies and actions.

02:30

Marking 77 years since end of WWII, Japanese leader says nation will never again wage war

Wang’s comments come weeks after the first in-person meeting between Kishida and Chinese President Xi Jinping, which took place on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (Apec) summit in Thailand last month.

At the meeting, Xi emphasised that as close neighbours and important countries in Asia and the world, China and Japan shared many common interests and ample cooperation potential. The importance of bilateral relations would not change, he said.

Kishida said they had agreed to boost communications on security matters, but “serious concerns” still existed over Chinese military activities around disputed territory in the East China Sea. The dispute is centred on a group of uninhabited islands claimed by Beijing as the Diaoyus, which Tokyo controls and calls the Senkaku.

Sino-Japanese ties have been tested in recent months following a visit to Taiwan by US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in August.

Beijing responded to her visit by launching unprecedented live-fire drills around Taiwan.

Japan said five of the ballistic missiles fired by the Chinese military fell into waters designated as its exclusive economic zone and lodged a diplomatic protest with Beijing.

But China rejected the complaint, saying the two sides had not agreed on EEZ limits.

03:07

‘US bases on Okinawa inevitable’: perceptions shift in Japan on American military presence

Days after Pelosi’s visit, China also cancelled a meeting between Foreign Minister Wang and his Japanese counterpart, over a G7 statement on the Taiwan Strait urging Beijing to resolve tensions peacefully.

Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi is expected to visit China after Xi and Kishida pledged to build up the bilateral relationship when they met on the Apec sidelines in Bangkok on November 17.