Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing on Tuesday called on Japan’s leaders to stop visiting a controversial Tokyo war shrine, comparing their actions to the worship of Germany’s Nazis after World War II.
“At present, the crux of the political difficulties facing Sino-Japanese political relations rests with certain Japanese leaders who still today worship the class-A criminals who led the war of invasion,” Li told reporters.
“On the history issue, China is the offended party. So now the key issue is for Japan’s leaders to summon up enough honesty and courage to correct their own erroneous activities.”
Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi has made five visits to the Yasukuni Shrine since taking office in 2001. The shrine honours some 2,5-million war dead, including 14 “Class-A” war criminals.
Li, repeating previous comments, compared visiting the Yasukuni Shrine to worship of Germany’s World War II Nazi leadership.
“A German official told me that German people cannot understand how Japanese leaders can do this. This kind of stupid thing is not moral in nature, this is what Germans are saying,” Li said. “They said that after World War II, not one German leader ever worshipped Hitler or the Nazis.”
China cut off top-level bilateral dialogue with Japan in October after Koizumi’s most recent visit to the shrine.
The Yasukuni visits are seen in China as proof that Japan is reluctant to admit it was guilty of imperialist aggression in the first half of the 20th century. Japan invaded China in the 1930s and 1940s, exacting a toll of 35-million dead and injured, mostly civilians, according to Chinese statistics.
While emphasizing China’s grievances over history, Li also pointed out the need to co-operate with its neighbour.
“We must persist in solving our disputes through dialogue and consultations on an equal basis,” he said, paraphrasing remarks last year by Chinese President Hu Jintao on how to promote better ties with Japan.
As an example of how the two nations might co-operate, he mentioned two days of talks between Chinese and Japanese diplomats that ended earlier on Tuesday in Beijing.
The talks, focusing on disputed energy-rich waters in the South China Sea, had been “pragmatic and constructive,” he said. “China and Japan have agreed to launch the next round of consultation as early as possible,” he said.
China and Japan have different views on the East China Sea issue, but expect to address their differences through negotiation and co-operation, he said.
In Tokyo, Japan’s Industry Minister, Toshihiro Nikai, said he wanted to hold the next meeting within a month, but expressed reluctance over a new proposal put forward by China.
“This is not a simple issue of energy, as it goes beyond to a territorial issue,” Nikai said.
Japan’s chief delegate to the talks, Kenichiro Sasae, also expressed reluctance over China’s offer but stopped short of disclosing its content to reporters.
The two nations, among the world’s top energy importers, have been sparring for years over potentially lucrative gas fields in a part of the East China Sea where their 200-nautical-mile exclusive economic zones overlap.
China began drilling unilaterally in the area in 2003. Japan is concerned that the Chunxiao and Duanqiao gas fields that China is developing stretch into what Tokyo considers its sector. — AFP