Japan's Kyodo News recently reported that China’s Coast Guard vessels have issued warnings via radio communications requesting Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) aircraft to immediately leave the airspace over and around the Diaoyutai Islands since January 2024. Chinese vessels claimed that JMSDF aircraft could violate Chinese territorial airspace. The Kyodo report believed that China’s recent action came after Xi Jinping called for effective protection of maritime rights and law enforcement when inspecting the command office for the East China Sea area of the China Coast Guard. Xi remarked that China must resolutely protect territorial sovereignty and maritime rights and interests. China must continuously strengthen efforts to protect sovereignty over the Diaoyutai Islands and will only march forward without retreating and will not give up one inch of territory, said Xi. The report further assessed that China may send vessels to the Diaoyutai Islands daily or even formulate measures to go on board and inspect Japanese fishing boats this year. China will also normalize its claim of sovereign airspace over the Diaoyutai Islands. These developments will intensify confrontation between China and Japan.
Factors affecting the development of relations between China and Japan can be distinguished between long-term structural problems and short- and medium-term political incidents. Factors in the former category include Japan’s historical responsibility for its aggression against China, disputes over the sovereignty of the Diaoyutai Islands and the East China Sea and geopolitical contradictions influenced by the international power landscape featuring confrontation between China and the U.S. Factors in the second category include the issue of Japan’s discharge of treated waste water from the Fukushima nuclear plant, the detention of Japanese citizens in China and Japan's designation of China as a security threat in several strategic documents.
Although China and Japan signed the Joint Communiqué and normalize diplomatic relations in 1972, the two sides still have not found solutions to various structural or even administrative disputes. China and Japan should stabilize their relations, mitigate security dilemma and deepen economic and trade cooperation for their respective development needs. However, they have never really improved bilateral relations. Negative views of the other side continue to grow in their societies. The mutually beneficial strategic relationship that China and Japan want to construct is gradually disappearing. The two sides can only barely maintain contact as they are stuck in an impasse and unable to address real problems.
In fact, two weeks before Xi Jinping's visit to the East China Sea area of the China Coast Guard, he met with Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on the sidelines of the APEC San Francisco Summit on November 16. Xi said at that time that 2023 marked the 45th anniversary of the China-Japan Treaty of Peace and Friendship, codifying the direction of peace, friendship and cooperation between the two countries. Xi called on the Japanese side to grasp the general trend of history, follow the trend of the times, focus on common interests, constructively manage differences and strive to build a China-Japan relationship for the new era. Obviously, China intended to use the meeting as a "new starting point" to improve relations with Japan.
It is difficult to reverse the downward pressure on the Chinese economy right now. Facing a continuous flight of Japanese capital and Japan’s export control on critical technologies and equipment, China does need to improve relations with Japan based on practical consideration. This was also the main reason that Xi agreed to hold a summit meeting Japan. However, Kishida said after the meeting that he urged China to deal with the issue of discharging treated nuclear waste water based on scientific evidence and strongly called for an immediate abolishment of import restrictions on Japanese seafood. Kishida also expressed serious concerns over China’s military activities in the region and reiterated the importance of peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait. He said that China and Japan should take a constructive attitude and engage in consultation and dialogue. It is obvious that the two leaders were talking past each other. The meeting had very limited substantive effect to alleviate contradictions between China and Japan, not to mention changing the confrontational nature of their relations.
A large delegation from Japan's financial and economic communities organized by the Japan Business Federation visited China in late January to explore ways to improve relations between China and Japan, reflecting that Japan still has high expectations for the resumption of exchanges with China, its largest export market. Beijing also welcomes such exchanges as it is actively preventing an economic recession and has no intention to aggravate political and economic disputes with Japan. However, sovereignty disputes in the East China Sea and the definition of the status quo in the Taiwan Strait both involve the core interests of China and Japan. There is little room for concession. In terms of escalating sovereignty disputes over the Diaoyutai Islands, Beijing is well aware that Japan's nationalization of the Diaoyutai Islands is irreversible. However, stoking related disputes will help China to test Japan's compromise with China on various issues, including Taiwan. China will use related developments to compete with Japan.
Now let us return to the confrontation between China and Japan in the Diaoyutai Islands. The two sides have launched a hotline for maritime and aerial communication after security dialogue in February 2023. However, given their political nature, sovereignty issues need to be resolved through political consultations. Otherwise, judging from past experience, crisis management mechanisms established between China and other countries tend to work smoothly only when bilateral relations are stable.
（Wen-Feng Tzou, Assistant Professor of the Graduate Institute of Strategic Studies at National Defense University）
（Excerpt translated to English by Cindy Li）
