China warned the public against staging fresh protests when Japanese Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura visits this weekend in an attempt to head off a repeat of last week's violent anti-Japanese demonstrations.
Thousands took part in protests in at least four Chinese cities last Saturday and Sunday, and Internet chatrooms, e-mails and mobile phone messages have been urging people to join a new round of protests in cities across China this weekend.
Foreign missions, wary of possible violence after demonstrators threw rocks and eggs at Japanese diplomatic missions and attacked Japanese businesses last week cautioned their citizens about new protests.
PHOTO: AFP
The demonstrations, triggered by what many see as Japan's failure to own up to World War II atrocities, come at a time that Japan is seeking a permanent seat on the UN Security Council, a move that China firmly opposes.
While last weekend's protests appeared to have had tacit state approval, the government appealed to demonstrators to avoid "extreme activities" and yesterday Beijing police warned against "unapproved or harmful" activities.
"Any assemblies, protests and demonstrations should be approved by the public security organ," the China News Service quoted a Beijing police spokesman as saying.
Unapproved and harmful activities were "illegal" and would be punished, it said.
For its part, Japan pledged not to let a series of disputes with China hinder their broader relationship.
"We must deepen mutual understanding and trust through dialogue and not allow individual issues to become an obstacle to the development of the overall Japan-China relationship," the Japanese Foreign Ministry said in an annual diplomatic report.
Machimura flies to Beijing tomorrow to meet Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing (
Tokyo, through the Japanese chamber of commerce in China, warned Japanese firms to be on guard against possible protests. Japanese diplomatic missions in China have also cautioned Japanese in China about the protests, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda said.
"It seems the Chinese side is making various efforts. I would like to monitor the situation," Hosoda told reporters.
The Foreign Ministry in Tokyo, meanwhile, issued an annual report that accused China of threatening Japanese security in a series of incidents including illegal prospecting for oil in Japan's exclusive economic zone and an incursion into Japan's territorial waters.
The report cited China's undersea resource explorations in disputed waters in the East China Sea and an incursion by a Chinese nuclear submarine in those waters last year, calling them "serious problems that threatened Japan's national security, sovereignty and other rights."
However, despite such problems, it is important to build trust and understanding through dialogue, the report said.
"Stability in Japan-China relations is crucial for peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific region," the report said. "And we agreed on the need for dialogue despite difference in opinions in specific areas."
‘ABUSE OF POWER’: Lee Chun-yi allegedly used a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a pet grooming salon and take his wife to restaurants, media reports said Control Yuan Secretary-General Lee Chun-yi (李俊俋) resigned on Sunday night, admitting that he had misused a government vehicle, as reported by the media. Control Yuan Vice President Lee Hung-chun (李鴻鈞) yesterday apologized to the public over the issue. The watchdog body would follow up on similar accusations made by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and would investigate the alleged misuse of government vehicles by three other Control Yuan members: Su Li-chiung (蘇麗瓊), Lin Yu-jung (林郁容) and Wang Jung-chang (王榮璋), Lee Hung-chun said. Lee Chun-yi in a statement apologized for using a Control Yuan vehicle to transport his dog to a
Taiwan yesterday denied Chinese allegations that its military was behind a cyberattack on a technology company in Guangzhou, after city authorities issued warrants for 20 suspects. The Guangzhou Municipal Public Security Bureau earlier yesterday issued warrants for 20 people it identified as members of the Information, Communications and Electronic Force Command (ICEFCOM). The bureau alleged they were behind a May 20 cyberattack targeting the backend system of a self-service facility at the company. “ICEFCOM, under Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party, directed the illegal attack,” the warrant says. The bureau placed a bounty of 10,000 yuan (US$1,392) on each of the 20 people named in
The High Court yesterday found a New Taipei City woman guilty of charges related to helping Beijing secure surrender agreements from military service members. Lee Huei-hsin (李慧馨) was sentenced to six years and eight months in prison for breaching the National Security Act (國家安全法), making illegal compacts with government employees and bribery, the court said. The verdict is final. Lee, the manager of a temple in the city’s Lujhou District (蘆洲), was accused of arranging for eight service members to make surrender pledges to the Chinese People’s Liberation Army in exchange for money, the court said. The pledges, which required them to provide identification
INDO-PACIFIC REGION: Royal Navy ships exercise the right of freedom of navigation, including in the Taiwan Strait and South China Sea, the UK’s Tony Radakin told a summit Freedom of navigation in the Indo-Pacific region is as important as it is in the English Channel, British Chief of the Defence Staff Admiral Tony Radakin said at a summit in Singapore on Saturday. The remark came as the British Royal Navy’s flagship aircraft carrier, the HMS Prince of Wales, is on an eight-month deployment to the Indo-Pacific region as head of an international carrier strike group. “Upholding the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, and with it, the principles of the freedom of navigation, in this part of the world matters to us just as it matters in the
RSS