Russian President Vladimir Putin, South Korean President Park Geun-hye and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon shine at the top of China’s guest list for tomorrow’s grand commemorations of the 70th anniversary of Japan’s defeat in World War II. After them, the wattage gets pretty low.
Beijing said the attendance of 30 overseas leaders from nations ranging from Mongolia to Egypt to Venezuela is a sign that China’s long-undervalued contributions to that hallowed victory in 1945 are finally getting their proper due.
However, that is clouded by the absence of high-level representatives from major Western democracies, whose forces played a key role in the Allied victory, such as the US, Britain, France and Australia.
Given Beijing’s political repression at home and its aggressive moves to assert territorial claims abroad, many nations appear reluctant to associate too closely with an event calculated to elevate the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and its leader, Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), on the world stage.
China is to celebrate victory in what it calls the “Chinese People’s War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression and the World Anti-Fascist War,” which marks the day after Japan formally surrendered to Allied forces aboard a US naval ship 70 years ago.
The festivities in Beijing are to be centered on a massive military parade, featuring more than 12,000 troops, scores of warplanes and more than 500 pieces of hardware, including tanks, artillery and intercontinental ballistic missiles.
Britain, Germany and Japan are dispatching only retired government leaders, including former British prime minister Tony Blair. The US is to be represented only by its ambassador to China, Max Baucus.
Just one head of state from an EU nation is to attend: Czech President Milos Zeman.
“I think one has to understand that there has always been an uneasiness [about] these kinds of military parades,” EU ambassador to China Hans Dietmar Schweisgut said.
Even North Korean leader Kim Jong-un is giving the event a skip, although he has never left his authoritarian nation since taking power in late 2011.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe declined his invitation, sending China-friendly former Japanese prime minister Tomiichi Murayama in his place. The Philippines, with who China has tangled most in the South China Sea, is sending former Philippine president Joseph Estrada.
“We have invited leaders of relevant countries to join the Chinese people to celebrate this great day, but it is their own decision. For us, we respect and welcome all guests,” Chinese Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Zhang Ming (張銘) said late last month.
The Global Times, a newspaper published by the CCP mouthpiece, People’s Daily, has cited experts as saying the turnout “indicates the worldwide acknowledgment of China’s long-ignored contribution to the Asian battlefield during World War II as well as China’s rising global status.
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