This article was first published by Pacific Forum and is republished with kind permission. Read the original here. As Beijing looked on angrily, the US and Japanese foreign and defense ministers met in Tokyo during the last week of July to announce they will increase bilateral security cooperation. The US government said it will upgrade its military […]

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In recent years, the Japanese government has made its desire to decouple from China amid rising Sino-American economic rivalry increasingly clear. As early as 2020, the Shinzo Abe administration handed subsidies worth 70 billion yen (US$446.5 million) for Japanese manufacturers to move production from China to Southeast Asia or back to Japan. Revisions to its […]

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Chinese military personnel are visiting their Japanese counterparts this week, raising hopes of more stable bilateral relations or at least greater familiarity to manage any future crises. What it probably won’t do, however, is make any fundamental change in their East Asia stand-off. On May 14, a delegation of 20 People’s Liberation Army (PLA) senior […]

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Days and nights in Kyoto Days and nights Night and days In Kyoto Welcome to information retrieval – Michael Kamen, Brazil As the threat of deflation stalks China’s economy, the China-watching herd has resurfaced an old question from the rotation: Is China turning Japanese? The well-known script, in the words of a media-anointed analyst:  China’s […]

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On August 24, 2023, immediately after Japanese authorities released treated wastewater from the Fukushima nuclear plant into the Pacific Ocean, China suspended all seafood imports from Japan.  While the public’s concerns over contamination might justify the decision, China’s track record of employing plausible deniability, coupled with Japan’s compliance with international safety standards and China’s similar nuclear waste management practices, raises questions about China’s motivations. […]

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China has banned the imports of all aquatic products from Japan after the latter released wastewater from the Fukushima nuclear plant into the sea on Thursday. The ban took effect immediately on Thursday as Tokyo decided to dispose of 1.34 million tons of wastewater from the nuclear power plant, which was destroyed by a tsunami […]

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TOKYO – Japan’s Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry Yasutoshi Nishimura has spent a week visiting five countries in southern Africa with Ichiro Takahara, chairman and CEO of the state’s Japan Organization for Metals and Energy Security (JOGMEC). Prior to his departure, Nishimura told Japan’s Sankei Shimbun newspaper that he aimed to secure access to […]

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The comfort women controversy has dogged Tokyo-Seoul relations since the early 1990s, but Japan’s wartime network of “comfort stations” or military brothels was located mainly in China. Though the “Patriotic War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression” has long been central to the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) patriotic education campaign, Beijing has proven comparatively hesitant and ambivalent on […]

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As China expands its presence among Pacific Island countries by building dual-use infrastructure and providing loans, Japan is seeking to counter Beijing’s influence in the region. The Japanese government is engaging Pacific Island countries through infrastructure projects and multilateral forums to mitigate China’s Pacific presence. Japan has increased its emphasis on an “all Japan” approach […]

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China has stepped up its naval and air drills around the Nansei/Ryukyu Islands, ratcheting tensions alongside a rapidly re-arming Japan. Japan News recently reported that a Chinese carrier battlegroup spearheaded by the Liaoning has been conducting naval drills simulating an attack on the Nansei/Ryukyu Islands since December 16, with the exercises set to end on […]

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TOKYO – On October 18, the top article on the front page of Japan’s leading business daily screamed that cutting off imports from China would cost Japan 53 trillion yen (US$353 billion) in lost production, or about 10% of annual gross domestic product (GDP). Meanwhile, the yen has depreciated by 31% against the US dollar […]

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