Japan's foreign minister yesterday called China a military threat, while a top government spokesman rebuffed conciliatory gestures by Beijing over a controversial war shrine, in comments likely to heighten tensions between the two nations.
Foreign Minister Taro Aso, who has already angered China in recent months with a series of critical comments, questioned China's rapid military spending increases and its lack of transparency.
"It's not clear what China is using the money for. This creates a sense of threat for surrounding countries," he said on a Fuji Television Network talk show, in an unusually clear expression of Japanese government unease.
Chinese officials have insisted their country is open about spending and has increased military exchanges with other countries.
Chinese President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤) also made a rare conciliatory gesture toward Japan earlier last week by offering to hold a summit with Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi if he stops his visits to Yasukuni Shrine, which honors Japan's 2.5 million war dead -- including convicted war criminals.
But Chief Cabinet Spokesman Shinzo Abe -- seen as a front-runner to succeed the prime minister when his term runs out in September -- rejected that offer Sunday on the Fuji TV talk show.
"It is wrong for China to refuse talks just over one problem ... It's China that needs to take another step forward," Abe said, adding that how Japan commemorated its war dead was an internal affair.
"It is wrong for us to decide to stop our prime minister's visits to a shrine which is located in our country just because a foreign country demands it," Abe said.
"If you stop visiting Yasukuni because China demands it, then the next demand could be about the territorial disputes over the gas fields in the East China Sea," he said.
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