Japan’s largest opposition party, the Liberal Democratic Party, elected former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe its leader last week. On election back to his job as LDP leader again, Abe promised to do his utmost to return his party to power, not only for itself but for the purpose of building a strong and prosperous Japan where the people will feel happy being Japanese. Like his mentor Junichiro Koizumi, Abe is an ultra-nationalist who may ride on the rise of neo-nationalism in Japan to boost the LDP ‘s seat-holdings in the Lower House of the Diet, but not to the extent that it can win a single majority control in the 480-seat chamber. The LDP currently holds 118 seats, and may add a couple of dozens in a snap general election Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda is forced to call “as soon as practicable.” In other words, he cannot get his party back to power without making a coalition with a couple of smaller parties.
Noda’s Democratic Party of Japan, that currently holds 247 seats in the Lower House, a thin majority of seven, is expected to lose scores of seats in the snap election to fall from power. Abe’s party has an ally in the New Komeitou that holds 21 seats in the lower chamber and will keep that many at least after the election, but he needs to rely on Ichiro Ozawa, leader of the People’s Life First-Kizuna that holds 47 seats, for organizing a coalition with the Ishin-no-Kai of ultra-nationalist Mayor of Osaka Toru Hashimoto that is likely to win big in its debut general election.Of course, another ultra-nationalist, Governor Shintaro Ishihara of Tokyo, will chip in to complete the coalition to oust Noda’s party, which Ozawa helped create to put an end to the LDP’s almost uninterrupted one-party rule for half a century three years ago.
Though not an ultra-nationalist himself, Noda has turned tough on the question of the Senkaku Islands, called the Tiaoyutais or Diaoyutais in Chinese and claimed by Taiwan and the People’s Republic of China, after Ishihara announced more than three months ago he would buy three isles of the small uninhabited archipelago for his metropolis of Tokyo to defend against an imagined imminent Chinese takeover.As a matter of fact, Noda was compelled to talk tough against Beijing to plunge relations between Japan and China to such a new low as to make Beijing cancel the celebration of the 40th anniversary of normalization of relations on last Saturday.
If Noda calls the snap election next month, Abe, a grandson of Prime Minister Nobusuke Kish, may become head of government again before the end of this year. The first task Abe will have to tackle is to end the sovereignty row with Beijing and Taipei over the group of eight islets, lying only 100 miles northeast of Keelung.
Both Taipei and Beijing demand that Japan roll back its decision to nationalize the three Senkaku islands. Abe can’t and won’t cancel the contract of purchase with Kunioki Kurihara, and the sovereignty dispute can’t be settled. Japan insists its sovereignty over the Senakus is indisputable, albeit the dispute persists. Tokyo wants the International Court of Justice to pass on judgment, but Beijing doesn’t agree. Nor will Taipei, for Taiwan isn’t a U.N. member state. The United States may wish to mediate, but China is opposed because Beijing believes Uncle Sam is biased against China and in favor of his ally Japan.
Japan may be willing to start dialogue with China, which, however, is next to impossible now that both countries have been hijacked by public opinion in a spat over the disputed islets. A sudden surge of nationalism in both countries has made it difficult to talk sense over the row. Anti-Japanese sentiments are so high in China that large-scale protests may occur anytime over the Diaoyutais after a brief lapse.Anti-Chinese sentiments have been roused in Japan, which are unlikely to be cooled by a signature movement launched by a civic group calling for self-reflection on the part of Japan for unlawfully occupying the Senkakus. One prime mover behind the movement is novelist Kenzaburo Oe who won the Nobel Prize in literature in 1994. Another author likely to win the same prize, Haruki Murakami is warning of the peril of politicians offering the “cheap liquor” of nationalism to intoxicate the unknowing people.
Abe isn’t liked in Beijing for he has provoked anger in China by saying that there is no evidence that women were forced to become sex slaves by the Japanese imperial army.Moreover, he has promised “to protect Japan’s land and sea and the lives of the Japanese people, no matter what.” That means he would deal more harshly with Beijing, if and when Chinese protests get out of hand and Japanese lives are threatened in China.At any rate, he is unable to end the row between Japan and China anytime soon.
But there is a chance that Taiwan may end its spat with Japan over its traditional fishing grounds of the Tiaoyutais.The Japanese coastguardsmen have shown restraint when Taiwan’s fishing fleet staged a demonstration only 2.1 miles off Uotsuri-jima, the largest of the Senkakus, with a heavy escort by a dozen patrol vessels of the Central Coast Guard Administration a week ago on last Monday. Signs are that the Japanese are willing and ready to resume the negotiations on fisheries suspended for more than three years to give concession.
One reason for Japan’s softening its stance is that Tokyo doesn’t want to have three sovereignty rows at the same time. Aside from the row over the Senkakus, Japan is grappling with similar disputes with South Korea over Takeshi-shima or Dokdo in the Sea of Japan and with Russia over what is known in Japan as its Northern Territory, the four Kurile islands of Habomai, Kunashiri, Etorofu and Shikotan occupied by the Soviet Union shortly before the end of the Second World War.
When the current spat between Taipei and Tokyo started, Taiwan hinted that the fishery talks would be boycotted. There should be no boycott. It behooves Taipei to go to the negotiating table while Noda is still in office. Even after Abe’s takeover, Taiwan has to resume the talks, for it’s time to give our fishermen easy access to the waters of the Tiaoyutais.
〈本文僅供參考，不代表本會立場〉
（本文刊載於101.10.01 The China Post 第4版）
王順民
劉新圓
