iTODAY: Chinas behaviour in islands row a threat to peace, warns Japan TOKYO - The verbal sparring across the East China Sea continued yesterday, with Japans Defence Minister saying that Beijings behaviour in its territorial dispute with Tokyo is jeopardising peace. I believe the intrusions by China in the territorial waters around the Senkaku islands fall in the grey zone (between) peacetime and an emergency situation, Mr Itsunori Onodera told reporters in Tokyo. His remarks, coming just days after China warned that a reported Japanese plan to shoot down its drones would constitute an act of war, are likely to fuel concerns that the two neighbours could be heading towards conflict over a group of tiny islands in the East China Sea, known as Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China. The long-running dispute has taken a turn for the worse after the Japanese government bought three of the islands from a private Japanese owner last year. On Monday, Chinas coastguard sent four vessels into the waters around the islands, where they stayed for two hours, shadowed by their Japanese counterparts. The incident came after three consecutive days in which Tokyo scrambled jets to meet Chinese aircraft - which Mr Onodera said were two early-warning aircraft and two bombers - flying close to Japanese airspace as they crossed a strait that leads into the Pacific Ocean. It was unusual that so many aircraft flew between the Okinawan main island and Miyako island. We consider that it is also very unusual that it occurred for three days in a row, he said yesterday. He described the aircraft movement as one of the trends showing that China is now vigorously expanding its areas of activities, including into the open ocean. Mr Onoderas remarks came on the heels of those made by Chinas Defence Ministry, which said on Saturday that any attempt by Japan to shoot down Chinese aircraft would constitute a serious provocation, an act of war of sorts. According to media reports, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe last week approved defence plans that envisaged using air force planes to shoot down unmanned aircraft in Japanese airspace. The move came after an unmanned drone flew close to the disputed islands last month. The drone appeared to return to Chinese airspace, reports said. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said yesterday that Japan should stop hyping up the external threat theory and elaborate to the international community the true intent of (its) military build-up. AGENCIES
Posted on: Tue, 29 Oct 2013 23:39:08 +0000
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