Xinhua News Agency, Beijing, July 14th: Title: What is Japan’s intention to frequently disrupt the South China Sea?
Xinhua News Agency reporter
Ten years after the so-called “South China Sea Arbitration Award” was issued, Japan’s performance is particularly worthy of vigilance.
Japan followed suit and participated in the so-called 10-year joint statement "to commemorate the South China Sea Arbitration Award" issued by the United States, the Philippines and other countries; Foreign Minister Toshimitsu Motegi blatantly defended the illegal "award", attacked and accused China's legitimate claims, and falsely claimed that Japan is a "stakeholder" in South China Sea affairs.
Why is a country outside the region trying so hard to stir up a so-called "ruling" that is illegal, invalid and non-binding at this point?The answer is of course not the so-called "maintenance of international rule of law". Instead, it is using the issue to stir up trouble and trying to use the South China Sea issue to open new channels for overseas military expansion.
Since the Takaichi Sanae government came to power, Japan has become more blatantly involved in South China Sea affairs.In this year's "Balikan" joint military exercise between the United States and the Philippines, Japan dispatched combat personnel on a large scale for the first time and even launched offensive missiles in the Philippines for the first time since World War II.From selling frigates and other lethal weapons to the Philippines, to signing the Japan-Philippines "Reciprocal Access Agreement" and "Mutual Provision of Materials and Labor Services Agreement", and launching negotiations on the "Military Intelligence Protection Agreement", Japan's plan to use the Philippines as a "springboard" to gradually promote the substantive expansion of its military power overseas is clearly revealed.
These trends outline the dangerous path for Japan to intervene in the South China Sea: relying on the Japan-Philippines linkage, extending the radius of Japan’s southwest military activities from the mainland to the South China Sea; using weapons and equipment, joint exercises and agreement arrangements as the starting point, gradually setting up channels, pivots and mechanisms required for overseas operations; and then packaging extraterritorial military intervention as a "contribution" to the so-called "regional security" and "rules and order."In this way, Japan can promote overseas military activities from temporary participation to regular deployment, and then substantially break through the principles of Japan's constitution, international law and "exclusive defense".
Expanding the overseas activities of the Self-Defense Forces requires an excuse, and the so-called "South China Sea Arbitration Award" has become Japan's handy tool.The reason why Japan is vigorously hyping up this illegal "ruling" is because it provides a set of ready-made rhetoric: smearing China as an "unruly party" and creating "necessity" for extraterritorial forces to intervene in the South China Sea; packaging Japan, a non-party country, as a "stakeholder" to give "legitimacy" to its intervention in South China Sea affairs; and smearing the increasing military cooperation between Japan and the Philippines as a measure to maintain "freedom of navigation" and "regional stability", thereby dispelling the pressure of public opinion from the international community on its military expansion.
In fact, the so-called "South China Sea Arbitration Case" was unfair from the beginning.As early as ten years ago, this so-called "award" was made by an ad hoc arbitral tribunal organized by Japanese judge Shunji Yanai, then president of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea.Shunji Yanai served as Japan's Undersecretary of Foreign Affairs and Ambassador to the United States. He was also the chairman of the "Symposium on Rebuilding the Legal Foundation for Security and Security" established by former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, and has been assisting Abe in lifting the ban on the right of collective self-defense.With such a "right-wing hawk" leading the appointment of "arbitrators" and other related procedures, the objectivity, fairness and legitimacy of the so-called "award" have been lost from the beginning.Motobumi Asai, head of the China Preparatory Course at the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, bluntly pointed out that the so-called "arbitral tribunal" was built by Yanai based on considering the intentions of the Abe regime.
When looking at Japan’s various dangerous trends in the South China Sea, its history of foreign aggression and expansion cannot be ignored.As early as the end of the 19th century, Japanese militarism turned its greedy eyes to the South China Sea.During World War II, Japan used it as an important strategic fulcrum for its "southern advance" and blatantly invaded and occupied China's Xisha and Nansha Islands, bringing serious disasters to China and other countries in the region.After the war, according to international legal documents such as the Cairo Declaration and the Potsdam Proclamation, the Chinese territory stolen by Japan, including the South China Sea Islands, was returned to China in law and fact.Now, Japan has once again intervened in South China Sea affairs under the banner of so-called "stakeholder", and its ambition of "remilitarization" is alarming.
Through legal manipulation, alliance bundling, and military expansion, Japan has stepped up its efforts on the South China Sea issue, which reflects the dangerous actions of its right-wing forces that continue to loosen the post-war system and seek to revive militarism.
The South China Sea is not a testing ground for Japan’s pursuit of military expansion, nor is it a breakthrough for Japan to revisit its old militaristic dream.Any sinister intention to win over external forces to create geopolitical confrontation, challenge the post-war international order, and undermine peace and stability in the South China Sea will never succeed in the face of China's firm determination to defend its territorial sovereignty and maritime rights and interests, the common will of the Asian people to safeguard peace and development, and the powerful force of the international community to uphold fairness and justice.
