Wed, Apr 20, 2005 page1

• Beijing offers to fix windows, but little else

  MIXED SIGNALS China moved to defuse tensions with Japan with the repair offer, but also kept the heat on Tokyo by invoking Japanese bioweapons atrocities in World War II

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  China offered to repair damage by protesters to Japan's embassy in Beijing, but kept up pressure in a diplomatic row yesterday, invoking wartime atrocities and saying Japan needed to show sincerity to reverse a downward spiral in relations.

  The Chinese Foreign Ministry said a two-day visit to Beijing by Japanese Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura to patch things up had yielded consensus on some issues.

  But the two sides remained far apart on broader disputes that have dragged relations to their lowest point in decades.

  China has seen three weekends of violent protests against Japan, with many angry about a revised Japanese school textbook they say whitewashes Japan's wartime history. Protesters also oppose Japan's bid for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council.

  "There have already been statements," said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang (秦鋼). "What's key is action."

  The Asian powerhouses appear to be talking past each other, risking a high-stakes partnership worth US$178 billion in annual trade. Still, there have been gestures.

  Protesters smashed more than 20 windows at Japan's embassy in Beijing as thousands of demonstrators converged on it on April 9, an embassy spokesman said yesterday, adding that a company under the Chinese Foreign Ministry had offered to do the repair work.

  "They offered to fix the damage" to the embassy office building, he said. "My colleagues in Tokyo are thinking of how to respond to this offer."

  Protesters also damaged the Japanese ambassador's residence in Beijing and, in a separate protest this weekend, the consulate in Shanghai. Japan was still seeking compensation for the damage.

  The Chinese Foreign Ministry and Diplomatic Services Bureau, which manages diplomatic property in China, declined to comment.

  In a move unlikely to help matters, Japanese lawmakers said they planned to visit Tokyo's Yasukuni Shrine, a Shinto sanctuary where convicted Japanese war criminals are honored along with the nation's 2.5 million military war dead.

  They set their shrine visit for Friday, when Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) are expected to meet on the sidelines of a multilateral summit in Jakarta to try to mend ties.

  China says repeated trips to the shrine by Japanese leaders including Koizumi are the top irritant to relations.

  "We hope Japan's leaders will fully respect the feelings of the victims in Asian countries, including China," Qin said.

  Koizumi defended the visits yesterday, saying they do not harm Japan's interests.

  "Each country has its own history and there are differences in tradition and ways of thinking," he said.

  Keeping Japan's wartime past in the public spotlight, the official Xinhua News Agency said China would seek UNESCO World Heritage protection for the ruins of a Japanese germ warfare center during World War II called Unit 731.

  Located in northeastern China, the labs, prisons and crematoria played grim host to experiments on humans to develop germ weapons, like bubonic plague, typhoid, anthrax and cholera.

  "We will apply for World Heritage status to let more people in the world know the truth," Wang Peng, curator of the 731 Exhibition Hall, was quoted as saying.

  Tokyo neither denies nor recognizes the activities of the unit.

  Meanwhile, in a sudden shift, Chinese nationalist Web sites that have encouraged sometimes violent anti-Japanese protests yesterday urged supporters not to target Japanese citizens.

  "We oppose the Japanese right-wingers and the politicians that support them, not the Japanese people," said a statement on the Web site 9-18.com, which earlier had publicized details of protests.

  "Friendly Japanese people are our friends and brothers in arms," the statement said.

  The site's name refers to the date of the Sept. 19, 1931, start of Japan's invasion of China.

  The Web sites' statements appeared aimed at preventing violence at upcoming protests, several of which are scheduled for early next month. They also echoed government appeals for calm.

  Another Web site, the Aiguozhe Patriotic Alliance Net, said violence would hurt the nationalist cause.

  While mostly peaceful, protests have led to some "inharmonious, even unhappy events," the statement said. "This is a long battle, and we must avoid senseless, rash acts."

  Some visitors to the sites rejected appeals for calm.

  "What we need now is blood, not logic," said one unsigned posting on the Aiguozhe site.

  In Japan, there have been signs that a backlash may be building. Police cited 25 cases of harassment against Chinese interests since the protests in China began, including minor damage to the ambassador's residence and a Chinese-language school in Tokyo.

  UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan also weighed in on Monday in New York, encouraging Chinese and Japanese leaders to use their attendance at a Jakarta summit tomorrow to try to resolve their differences peacefully.
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