Escalation in the “restless territories. Japanese Chinese Islands

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Story

2012

In the area of ​​the islands there are deposits of natural gas, which China intends to develop. Official Tokyo, on the other hand, claims that the sea border of the two states clearly delimits these territories, and the gas-rich areas belong to Japan. On this moment Tokyo authorities lease these islands from private owners, who are Japanese citizens.

On July 11, patrol ships of the Chinese Navy were maneuvering off the coast of Senkaku Island. In this regard, on July 15, 2012, the Japanese ambassador to the PRC was recalled for consultations.

On August 19, anti-Japanese demonstrations took place in China, in a number of places ending in pogroms of Japanese shops and Japanese-made cars. The reason for the speeches was the fact that a group of Japanese citizens landed on the disputed islands and hoisted the flag of Japan there.

On September 5, Japanese media reported that the Japanese government was able to negotiate with a private owner of 3 of the 5 Senkaku Islands to buy them for 2 billion 50 million yen, exceeding the offer of Tokyo Prefecture.

On September 11, China responded to Japan's decision by sending two warships to the disputed islands "to protect sovereignty." The Chinese Foreign Ministry explained that if Japan does not refuse to buy the Senkaku Islands, which the PRC considers historically belonging to it, then the incident could threaten with "serious consequences." Mass anti-Japanese pogroms began that same week, which led to the closure of factories owned by Japanese companies.

On September 16, relations between China and Japan escalated after mass protests began in China against Japan's "nationalization" of the islands, which the PRC considers its territory. Anti-Japanese demonstrations with the participation of several thousand people are engulfed in Shanghai, Guangzhou, Qingdao and Chengdu.

Later, 1,000 Chinese fishing boats make their way to the Japanese-controlled Senkaku Islands. On the same day, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People's Republic of China announced that Chinese government is ready to submit part of the documents regarding the outer limit of the continental shelf beyond the 200-mile maritime zone in the East China Sea to the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf, established on the basis of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea.

Two of the 11 Chinese military patrol ships cruising near the Senkaku Islands entered Japanese territorial waters.

Before proceeding directly to the history of the development of the conflict around the Senkaku Islands, it is necessary to give brief reference about these territories geographical location, availability of fossil resources and location in the Asia-Pacific region.

The Senkaku (Japanese name) or Diaoyu (Chinese name) group of islands is located in the East China Sea and consists of five uninhabited islands and three rocks, including Uotsuri, Kitakojima, Minamikojima, Kuba, Tai?se?, Okinokitaiva, Okinominamiiva, and Tobise. The islands are located about 170 km east of Taiwan, 200 miles from mainland China and 170 km from Okinawa. Most big Island- Uotsuri, whose area is 3.6 square meters. km. The smallest in area is the island of Okinominamiiva - 0.01 sq. km Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan. Senkaku Islands, 2012. URL: http://www.ru.emb-japan.go.jp/APP/SenkakuIslands_20121129NEW_rus.pdf. Geographically, the islands are part of Taiwan's continental shelf" The Times". Universal Atlas of the world, 1985. P. 76. , and the depth of the sea between China, Taiwan and the islands does not exceed 200 meters.

Currently, Japan exercises administrative control over the islands, but the Taiwanese authorities and the PRC government dispute this right of Japan.

Islands do not have reserves fresh water, there are few plant resources, the coastal areas of the islands are rich in fish. Currently, due to the large catch of fish, there is a depletion of fish stocks David G Muller Jr. China as a maritime Power, 1983. P. 191.

In 1968, a UN-sponsored expedition discovered that the continental shelf between Japan and Taiwan is possibly one of the richest oil and gas fields in the Asia-Pacific region. David G Muller Jr. Op. cit. P. 196..

Thus, the potential presence of huge oil and gas reserves, so necessary for developing China and Japan suffering from a lack of resources, subsequently becomes the main reason for the escalation of the conflict and the growth of economic interest in the islands.

The strategic importance of the islands is explained by their proximity to the important for both sides sea ​​routes. For China, this is the most north-eastern point in the East China Sea, for Japan - the south-western one. Crude oil supplies from the Middle East to Japan pass through the area. Moreover, given the advantageous position of the islands, a country that has sovereignty over these territories gets the opportunity to "observe" the territory neighboring state. Hence, strategic importance islands plays no less important role than the economic one.

This autumn, the territorial conflict between China and Japan flared up again over disputed islands Senkaku (in Chinese interpretation - Diaoyu).

This conflict has a long history. In 1895, the islands went to Japan under the Treaty of Shimonoseki, which ended the first Sino-Japanese war. In the period 1900 - 1940. On the islands of Kubajima and Uotsurishima, there were 2 settlements of Japanese fishermen, with a total of 248 inhabitants. There was also a bonita processing plant on the island of Wotsurijima. Due to the crisis in the Japanese fishing industry, the factory closed and the settlements were abandoned by the beginning of 1941.

In 1945, Japan lost the war and Senkaku, along with Okinawa, came under US jurisdiction. But in 1971, the United States returned Okinawa to Japan, giving her Senkaku as well. The PRC, as well as Taiwan, did not express any protest against the inclusion of these islands in the number of regions under US administration under Article III of the San Francisco Peace Treaty.

Until recently, the Senkaku archipelago belonged to a private Japanese person, but in the summer of 2012, the Japanese authorities bought the islands, returning them to public ownership. Now, de jure, Japan has received the right to develop promising hydrocarbon deposits discovered in this area. This turn of events led to a sharp complication of bilateral relations and a surge of anti-Japanese and anti-Chinese sentiment.

The islands of the archipelago in themselves are not of economic interest, but they give the right to a shelf and territorial waters rich in fish. Chinese fishermen annually catch thousands of tons of fish in the waters of the archipelago, which cannot please Japan, whose patrol ships regularly round up Chinese sailors.

While it was only a matter of fish, the conflict over the islands was in a sluggish form, but with the discovery of decent natural gas reserves on the shelf, estimated at about 200 billion cubic meters, it radically changed the situation, and the conflict escalated to the maximum. Currently, there is no hydrocarbon production on the shelf of the disputed archipelago.

Here I would like to note that, according to the Chinese side, the islands should be returned to China in accordance with the provisions of the Cairo Declaration of 1943, which deprived Japan of all its conquered territories. On this basis, the PRC in 1992 declared this territory "originally Chinese."

In 2003, the Chinese installed an offshore platform at maritime border With Japanese waters and started drilling. The Japanese side expressed concern that the PRC could start extracting gas from deposits extending under Japanese territory.

In the spring of 2004, in connection with the detention by Japan of Chinese citizens who landed on the Diaoyu Islands (Senkaku), Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs of the PRC Zhang Yesui outlined the position of the Chinese government on the issue of the Diaoyu Islands: he noted that the Diaoyu Islands and the islands adjacent to them are the original territory of the PRC that China has an indisputable sovereign right over these islands, and that the determination and will of the Chinese Government and people to uphold the country's territorial sovereignty remain unchanged.

In October 2004, the first round of consultations took place on the problem of the Senkaku gas field, during which the parties agreed to resolve all issues exclusively through negotiations, without resorting to the use of force. At the same time, China rejected the demands of the Japanese side to acquaint it with the PRC's plans for drilling and gas production at Senkaku.

In April 2005, the Japanese government decided to start considering applications from Japanese companies for issuing licenses for gas production on the shelf of the archipelago. The PRC Foreign Ministry described the decision as "one-sided and provocative", pointing out that Japanese firms cannot work in the territory that the PRC considers its own. Japan's decision was one of the reasons that led to massive anti-Japanese demonstrations and pogroms in China.

In June 2005, the second round of Sino-Japanese consultations took place. They didn't bring results. China refused to stop gas production from the shelf on the border between Chinese and Japanese waters and again rejected the request of the Japanese side to provide it with information about the work on the shelf. The Chinese Foreign Ministry said that China has a "sovereign right" to extract gas in "waters close to the coast of the PRC" and not "the subject of a dispute with Japan."

The parties agreed to continue negotiations. Japan agreed to consider a Chinese proposal to jointly develop the field. Until 2010, Japan and China were negotiating the details of the project, but they were suspended at the initiative of the PRC after Japan detained a Chinese trawler in the area of ​​the disputed Senkaku (Diaoyu) Islands and arrested its captain.

In March 2011, a Chinese oil and gas company began developing the Shirakaba / Chunxiao / gas field. The Shirakaba / Chunxiao / field is located on the Chinese side of the line along which Japan separates the economic zones of the two countries, but Tokyo believes that it has access to a common gas reservoir East China Sea.

“The Diaoyu Archipelago and its adjacent islands have been Chinese territory since ancient times, and China has undeniable sovereignty over these islands. Any measures taken Japanese side in the waters near the Diaoyu Islands are illegal and invalid, ”such is the official point of view of the PRC on the situation around the Diaoyu Islands.

In the area of ​​the islands there are deposits of natural gas, which China intends to develop. However, official Tokyo claims that the maritime border of the two states clearly delimits these territories, and the gas-rich areas belong to Japan.

On July 11, 2012, patrol ships of the Chinese Navy were maneuvering off the coast of Senkaku Island. In this regard, on July 15, 2012, the Japanese Ambassador to China was recalled for consultations.

On August 19, 2012, anti-Japanese demonstrations took place in China, in a number of places ending in pogroms of Japanese stores and Japanese-made cars. The reason for the speeches was the fact that a group of Japanese citizens landed on the disputed islands and hoisted the flag of Japan there.

On September 11, 2012, China, in response to Japan's decision to buy the island from private owners, sent two warships to them "to protect sovereignty." The Chinese Foreign Ministry explained that if Japan does not refuse to buy the Senkaku Islands, which the PRC considers historically belonging to it, then the incident could threaten with "serious consequences." Mass anti-Japanese pogroms began the same week, which led to the closure of factories owned by Japanese companies.

On September 16, 2012, relations between China and Japan escalated after mass protests began in China against Japan's "nationalization" of the islands, which the PRC considers its territory. Anti-Japanese demonstrations with the participation of several thousand people are engulfed in Shanghai, Guangzhou, Qingdao and Chengdu.

Later, 1,000 Chinese fishing boats headed for the Japanese-controlled Senkaku Islands. On the same day, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the PRC announced that the Chinese government was ready to submit part of the documents regarding the outer limit of the continental shelf beyond the 200-mile maritime zone in the East China Sea to the UN Commission on the Limits of the Continental Shelf, established on the basis of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea.

Two of the 11 Chinese military patrol ships cruising near the Senkaku Islands entered Japanese territorial waters. Moreover, this time the Chinese ships approached another island - not the one that is the subject of a territorial dispute between Japan and China.

According to the Japanese Ministry of Defense, two destroyers and five more ships of the Chinese navy were spotted 49 kilometers southeast of Yonaguni, a small Japanese island in the very west of the country.

It is worth noting that the Chinese ships did not enter the territorial waters of Japan, but were in close proximity, which prompted the Japanese military to declare a state of high alert. The ships of the PRC and any further movement are being continuously monitored, both from the sea and from the air, the Japanese Ministry of Defense notes.

A few weeks ago, Chinese ships approached another Japanese island, Senkaku, which caused a new round of tension between the countries. The Chinese ships withdrew, but as we can see, not for long.

The PRC sent several military patrol ships to the archipelago, declaring to the protest of Japan that they were near their island and protect their fishermen who hunt in these waters rich in catch. The case reeked of war.

In response, Japan, together with the United States, conducted a demonstrative exercise to liberate the island captured by foreign invaders (according to legend). And although the operation was not large-scale, the signal was sent unequivocally - Japan is ready for the battle for the archipelago, and the United States will be on the side of Japan in this battle.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Li warned America against intervening in the dispute between China and Japan over ownership of the disputed Senkaku Islands.

The Foreign Ministry statement stressed that Beijing "warns Washington against its intention to take a special position on the issue of determining the ownership of the islands." Thus, the Foreign Ministry responded to the comments of high-ranking representatives of the US political circles, who noted that they "understand the motives that Tokyo is guided by, demanding respect for its sovereignty."

A day earlier, Foreign Minister Koichiro Gemba met in Tokyo with US Deputy Secretary of State William Burns and explained to the US side Japan's position on disputed territories.

He explained Japan's position on the Senkaku Islands to a senior US government official, stating that there was no question of territorial sovereignty over the Senkaku Islands. Japan controls these islands, which are claimed by China and Taiwan. However, he said that Japan is trying to intensify dialogue with China, while at the same time urging that country to act calmly.

On October 12, the PRC called on Tokyo to start a serious dialogue on the disputed islands in the East China Sea "taking into account the historical factor and realities." As Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Cui Tiankai said at a briefing in Moscow, Japan's current desire to provoke a conflict and not recognize the existence of a dispute over the Diaoyu Islands (Senkaku) harms not only bilateral relations, but also Japan itself.

As you can see, the situation is getting worse. It may become even more aggravated due to US intervention. As you know, Japan and the United States are bound by a joint defense treaty that effectively transfers defense Japanese islands USA. The State Department has already stated that the United States considers these islands a territory that Japan and the United States should jointly protect. This opinion was expressed by representatives of the State Department at the talks with the director of the Asia-Pacific Region Department of the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who was in the United States on a visit. The holding of joint Japanese-American exercises in the region of the disputed islands is proof of this. However, the United States is not happy with the escalation of the conflict. They have already warned both sides of the conflict that they will not interfere and take sides, indicated that Beijing and Tokyo should resolve the situation themselves.

Having no close partners in its region, Japan still counts on America as a guarantor of peace. Now she is keen to find out if Washington's focus and focus on Asia means less focus on Japan's security needs. Under these conditions, Tokyo simply needs an American-Japanese alliance. However, Washington, despite the fact that it retains its military bases in Japan, is trying to stay away from Tokyo's disputes with its neighbors, and especially over Senkaku.

However, it can be assumed that Washington is interested in keeping these islands for Japan. Because China has successfully turned into the world's second economy, which actually upsets the traditional balance of power in the Far East region, which was dominated by the US and Japan. No wonder Washington announced its intention to deploy 60% of the Navy's forces in the Asia-Pacific region. This is the only area where two US fleets operate - the 3rd and 7th. The Americans gradually began to make up for the lost positions: the Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam.

At the same time, in the situation with the islands, the United States calls on the parties to a peaceful search for a solution. Japanese officials have already shown a willingness to tone down the heat, saying their harsh comments have been misunderstood. The Chinese have not done this yet. At the same time, the Chinese are well aware that the development of the conflict will certainly be used by the United States in order to weaken its main competitor in the face of China.

However, for the United States itself, the situation is further complicated by the fact that Taiwan, also a long-standing and necessary geopolitical ally in the Asia-Pacific region, claims the islands. Therefore, the main task of American policy is to transfer the decision on Senkaku's ownership to the UN.

Thus, the conclusion can be made unequivocal: a military conflict between Japan and China is unlikely as long as the United States stands behind Japan. China is now not ready to embark on the path of military confrontation.

I believe that this issue will be resolved on the field of economic warfare and the transfer of the case to the international court of the UN. But what decision he will make depends largely on the position of the United States, which has long turned this international organization to your estate. Ivanov A.Yu. - "The problem of Noktundo Island is in the means mass media South Korea"

Territorial dispute between Japan and China

The subject of the dispute. The Senkaku Seto Islands (Diaoyutai Qundao in Chinese cartography) include five uninhabited islands and three reefs. with total area about 6.32 sq. km, located in the southern part of the East China Sea, 175 km north of Ishigaki Island (Ryukyu archipelago, Japan). They are located in the area with coordinates 25°46 north latitude and 123°31 east longitude, i.e. 190 km northeast of Taiwan and 420 km east of mainland China. At the moment, the Senkaku / Diaoyu Islands are under the jurisdiction of Japan, but China also claims its rights to them.

Question history. As in the case of Dokdo/Takeshima, the history of ownership of the Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands is so complicated that, from a legal point of view, one can argue endlessly about it. The problem of ownership of the Senkaku/Diaoyutai Islands became topical after the entry into force in 1994 of the Convention on the Law of the Sea. Its severity increased significantly after rich reserves of natural gas, estimated at approximately 200 billion cubic meters, were discovered in 1999 on the shelf of the disputed islands. In May 1999, reports appeared in the Japanese press that Chinese ships were conducting geological exploration offshore the Senkaku Islands in Japan's exclusive economic zone. Tokyo offered Beijing to hold joint consultations on the issue of maritime law in its application to the wealth of the disputed islands, but Beijing refused, declaring that the region of the islands was not recognized as an economic zone of Japan. In 2003, the Chinese set up an offshore platform near the sea border with Japanese waters and began drilling. In Japan, they suspected the Chinese side of trying to extract gas from deposits extending under Japanese territory. In October 2004, the parties held the first round of consultations on the Senkaku gas field, during which they agreed to resolve all issues exclusively through negotiations, without resorting to the use of force. At the same time, however, China rejected the demands of the Japanese side to acquaint it with the PRC's plans for drilling and gas production at Senkaku. In April 2005, the Japanese government decided to start considering applications from Japanese firms for issuing licenses for gas production on the shelf of the archipelago, which caused objections from the PRC Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which characterized this decision as one-sided and provocative, and became one of the reasons for mass anti-Japanese demonstrations and pogroms in China. In June 2005, the second round of Sino-Japanese consultations began, but they did not bring results, since China refused to stop gas production from the shelf on the border between Chinese and Japanese waters and again rejected the request of the Japanese side to provide it with information about the work on the shelf. The Chinese Foreign Ministry said that China has a "sovereign right" to extract gas in "waters close to the coast of the PRC" and not "the subject of a dispute with Japan." Indeed, while carrying out gas exploration work, China has never crossed the dividing line established by Japan, based on the de facto and legal ownership of the Senkaku / Diaoyu Islands. Later, Beijing came up with its proposals for the joint development of the field, and Tokyo agreed to consider them. Difficult negotiations began on the details of the project. However, in September 2010, they were interrupted by the Chinese side after the Japanese coast guard on September 7 detained a Chinese trawler that had rammed a Japanese patrol ship off the coast of Senkaku. Not wanting to show weakness, Japan, having released the crew of the trawler on September 13, 2010, extended the detention of its captain. China demanded the immediate release of the captain and compensation for his detention, and then tightened customs procedures for Japanese companies trading with it and imposed an embargo on the export to Japan of rare earth metals, without which the Japanese electronics and automotive industries cannot work. On September 22, 2010, Premier Wen Jiabao warned Japan against further escalation of the conflict over the incident of the detention of the captain of the Chinese ship off the disputed islands, warning: “If Japan continues to make mistakes, the PRC will take further measures, and all responsibility (for the consequences) will lie on the Japanese side." Japan chose not to escalate the conflict and released the captain of the Chinese ship on September 24, which was seen as a serious victory for the PRC and within Japan itself, caused criticism of the government from the nationalists.

On November 13, 2010, on the sidelines of the APEC summit in Yokohama, a meeting was held between Chinese President Hu Jintao and Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan. Although both of them, according to members of the Japanese delegation, “spoke in favor of promoting strategically mutually beneficial relations, as well as developing exchanges at the private and government levels,” at the same time they confirmed the invariability of the positions of the PRC and Japan on the disputed islands, which each side considers its own. It is noteworthy that before meeting with Hu Jintao, Naoto Kan held talks with US President Barack Obama, which also touched upon the issue of relations between both countries and China. B. Obama said at the end of them that "the US obligations to defend Japan are unchanged", and N. Kan thanked the American president "for the consistent support of Japan's position during the period of deterioration of its relations with China and Russia" .

Thus, the personal meeting between the leaders of China and Japan did not contribute much to reducing the level of confrontation between the parties on the issue of the disputed islands, which became even clearer from subsequent events. On November 21, 2010, there were reports in the media that Japan intended to send troops to the neighboring islands of the Senkaku archipelago to monitor Chinese activity in the area. December 19 about the intention to send to Senkaku / Diaoyu warships to monitor the situation announced by the Chinese side .

In March 2011, the Chinese oil and gas company CNOOC began developing the Shirakaba (Chunxiao) gas field, which is located on the Chinese side of the line along which Japan separates the economic zones of the two countries. However, Tokyo believes that in this way CNOOC gains access to the common gas reservoir of the East China Sea.

Prospects for resolving the dispute. From the statements of the Japanese side quoted above, it follows that Japan does not intend to yield to China in the dispute over Senkaku. The threat of losing rare earth metals prompted Japan to look for new sources of this valuable raw material. Shortly after the incident with the detention of Chinese fishermen, there were reports that Japanese companies were establishing rare earth mining in Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Vietnam and India. And in 2011, Japanese geologists discovered the largest deposits of rare earth metals in pacific ocean. True, industrial production will require large investments, improved technologies and the conclusion of international agreements, since the areas of the ocean where deposits are found are located in international waters. Thus, in the foreseeable future, China will remain the monopoly supplier of rare earth materials to Japan. By the way, not wanting to spoil mutually beneficial economic relations, in 2011, after Japanese concessions, Beijing lifted an unspoken ban on the supply of rare earth materials to Japan.

At the same time, Beijing's position on the Diaoyu/Senkaku has not changed: “The Diaoyu archipelago and its adjacent islands have been Chinese territory since ancient times, and China has indisputable sovereignty over these islands. Any measures taken by the Japanese side in the waters near the Diaoyu are illegal and invalid.

The position of Japan does not change either. On August 10, 2011, Yu. Edano, Secretary General of the Cabinet of Ministers, during a discussion of the issue of Senkaku in one of the parliamentary committees, stressed that Japan is ready to defend the Senkaku Islands by military force. He stated: "If other countries invade these islands, we will use the right of self-defense and drive them out at any cost," adding that Japan "controls these islands legally."

At the end of the summer of 2011 in Japan, there was a change in the leadership of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan and, accordingly, the head of the country's cabinet of ministers. On August 30, 2011, the Chinese state news agency Xinhua responded to this event with the headline "Japan's new prime minister must respect China's key interests and development needs." In order to improve relations with the PRC, it recommends that the Japanese leadership, in addition to refusing to visit the Yasukuni Shrine, "show sufficient respect for China's national sovereignty and territorial integrity, especially when it comes to issues related to the Diaoyu Islands, which are an integral part of China's territory..." . And further: “Beijing would also like to put aside these differences and jointly with Japan to develop resources in the waters surrounding the Diaoyu Islands, provided that Tokyo recognizes the full sovereignty of China over this archipelago. In addition, Japan should recognize China's legitimate need for military modernization to protect its growing national interests."

This passage allows us to draw at least three conclusions regarding the position of the PRC regarding the disputed territories of Diaoyu/Senkaku for the near future:

1) In order to please the mood of the country's public, the Chinese leadership will continue to make statements about the ownership of the Diaoyu Islands by China, but at the same time, not wanting to complicate relations, it will not insist on holding specific negotiations on the fate of the islands - the dispute, in accordance with the call of Deng Xiaoping, will be postponed for indefinite time.

2) China, which is interested in the economic development of the territories in the Diaoyu/Senkaku area, will insistently invite Japan to do this jointly. The chances of getting Japan's consent to this proposal are negligible.

3) China intends to further build up its military, primarily naval, potential in order to get more significant trump cards in future negotiations on territorial issues, and not only with Japan. However, China is unlikely to seriously intend to use military force, or at least the threat of its use in a dispute over territories, since they understand that in this case the United States will be on the side of Japan.

On the whole, according to Japanese journalists and experts, Y. Noda's coming to power in Tokyo was perceived with caution in Seoul and Beijing. The reason for this lies not only in his statement on August 15, 2011, which did not go unnoticed in Asia, that the Class A war criminals whose ashes rest in Yasukuni Shrine, which some Japanese politicians so love to visit, “are not military men.” criminals." The fact is that Y. Noda has a reputation as a politician who is ready to firmly defend Japan's national interests. Here is what the Asahi Shimbun wrote on September 1, 2011: “If there is one issue that can cause a surge of emotions in the usually calm Prime Minister Yo. Noda, it is Japan's territorial disputes. Japan's new leader says his stance on the issue of national security and sovereignty is shaped by the fact that he was raised by a father who served in an elite paratrooper regiment of the self-defense forces and saw the training of Japanese paratroopers. “I saw up close the fighters of the elite units who were undergoing hard training,” Y. Noda wrote in his book. “This experience helped shape my view of security.” About the position of Y. Noda on territorial dispute with China, the note says that they were clearly stated during the trip of the future prime minister to Beijing as part of a delegation of Japanese parliamentarians in December 2004. At that moment, relations between Japan and China were aggravated due to the incident with the entry of a Chinese nuclear submarine into Japanese territorial waters off the island of Ishigakijima in Okinawa Prefecture. At a dinner at the Beijing Diaoyutai Reception House, Yoh Noda raised the issue of the Senkaku/Diaoyutai Islands, urging both sides to refrain from acts that incite nationalism. To this, the head of the State Council of the People's Republic of China, Tang Jiaxuan, replied that the dividing line between the two countries "was drawn by Japan at its discretion", and China "never recognized this line." To this, Y. Noda replied that "from a historical point of view, the Senkaku Islands are Japanese territory."

There is no reason to believe that this position of Noda has changed since then. S. Maehara, Minister of Foreign Affairs in the cabinets of Y. Hatoyama and N. Kan, also adhered to tough positions on territorial issues. And although he was forced to resign due to a scandal with illegal political donations, immediately after his coming to power, Y. Noda appointed S. Maehara as head of the DPJ Political Research Committee. This means that the nationalist S. Maehara gets the opportunity to play an important role in shaping Japanese politics, incl. and external. Thus, we can assume that the change of leadership of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan and, accordingly, the Cabinet of Ministers of Japan at the end of the summer of 2010 did not create any prerequisites for facilitating the decision territorial disputes available to Japan with its neighbors.

Ending to be

William B. Hefin, Diayou/Senkaku islands dispute: Japan and China, Oceans apart. http://www.hawaii.edu/aplpj/articles/APLPJ_01.2_heflin.pdf

China's premier warns Japan against escalating conflict over disputed islands. http://www.ng.ru/world/2010-10-18/6_japan.html

Denisov I. “Japan will find justice for China at the bottom of the ocean”, Voice of Russia website, 07/5/2011, 16:42, http://rus.ruvnm/2011/07/05/52815657.html

Another press conference on July 5, 2022 with the official representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People's Republic of China, Hong Lei. http://ua.china-embassy.org/rus/fyrth/t837653.htm

Japan is ready to defend the Senkaku Islands if necessary. http://news.mail.ru/politics/6544033/

Japan "s new PM needs to respect China"s core interests, development demands, Xinhua, August 30, 2011.http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/90883/7583349.html

A familiar reaction: China, S. Korea wary of new PM, Asahi, 2011.08.31.

Senkaku is an archipelago located in the East China Sea, a couple of hundred kilometers from Taiwan. Up to the present day, fierce disputes have not stopped between Japan, China and Taiwan over territorial affiliation island groups.

Chinese authorities began to show interest in the archipelago in the 70s, when scientists discovered large oil deposits in this part of the East China Sea. Remarkably, until the 20th century, no one was interested in the tiny islands of the Celestial Empire. Only Japan has been exploring these uninhabited lands since the late 19th century. And already in 1895, the Japanese government freely included Senkaku in the Kingdom.

History of Senkaku

Japan included a group of islands in its territories on the basis of international law. The results of the Second World War led to the fact that Japan lost significant territories, including Senkaku, placed under the protectorate of the United States as part of the Nansei archipelago. In 1972, a document was signed between the countries, according to which Okinawa and a number of islands were returned to the Kingdom of Japan. The Nansei Archipelago was ceded to Japan by agreement.

China claims that Diaoyu Islands(under this name, Chinese schoolchildren know Senkaku) traces of the Qing Empire were previously found. However, Japanese scientists in 1885 voiced the groundlessness of such statements. After that, ordinary peasants, fishermen and entrepreneurs who sold dried bonito went there.

Senkaku is a beautiful stumbling block

We will not delve into political games Far East, we will describe only the sights of the beautiful archipelago. And there is something to see here. This is marvelous nature with landscapes characteristic of the sea tropics, and green hills with mystical structures, and authentic fishing villages where you can spend an unforgettable evening, and original culture islanders. Here you can ride a quad bike, taste Japanese seafood delicacies far from civilization, soak up the sun and forever leave in memory this part of Japan, so orthodox and unique.

The main attraction is Senkaku Bay, which lies on Sado Island. It is included in national park Quasi and represents beautiful place miraculous origin. You will definitely be offered a fascinating cruise around the bay on glass-bottomed boats.

You can get to the bay by bus from Ryotsu Port.