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Chinese textbooks are extreme in their interpretation of history, Japan's foreign minister said yesterday, a day after President Hu Jintao demanded Tokyo do more to improve relations damaged by its approval of new Japanese school textbooks that allegedly whitewash wartime atrocities. But despite the criticism, Nobutaka Machimura hailed the meeting between Mr Hu and Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi in Indonesia on Saturday, saying it paved the way for the two Asian powers to start repairing battered ties that had led to violent anti-Japan protests across China. "From the perspective of a Japanese person, Chinese textbooks appear to teach that...

Japan Criticizes China History Textbooks By JOSEPH COLEMAN Associated Press Writer April 24, 2005, 1:34 PM EDT TOKYO -- Japan opened a new front in its dispute with China on Sunday by sharply criticizing Beijing's history textbooks, signaling continued friction between the Asian powers despite high-profile diplomatic moves to quell tensions. Japanese Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura refuted Chinese claims that Japanese textbooks gloss over Tokyo's World War II-era atrocities, firing back in a TV talk show Sunday that China's schools indoctrinate their students with an unbalanced take on the past. "There is a tendency toward this in any country, but...

.... Earlier this month, Japan's education ministry approved revised history textbooks, which have been criticized by some Asian countries for distorting history and whitewashing Japan's colonial rules and wartime atrocities. The textbook issue triggered protests in Asian countries including China and South Korea. .... Chinese President Hu Jintao said here Saturday Japan should seriously reflect over its wartime history and properly handle the current difficult situation in the Sino-Japanese relations. ... Hu initiated five proposals on developing the Sino-Japanese relations. First, the Japanese government should strictly abide by the Sino-Japanese Joint Statement, the Peace and Friendship Treaty, and the Sino-Japanese...

People urged to shun unauthorized marches www.chinaview.cn 2005-04-21 20:17:49 BEIJING, April 21 (Xinhuanet) -- A spokesman for China's Ministry of Public Security Thursday asked the public not to attend unauthorized marches and protests or spread messages that instigate such events. The spokesman said the ministry fully understands the patriotic sentiments of the masses of people, including students, that participated in the recent spontaneous protest demonstrations in Beijing and Shanghai over Japan's offensive attitude toward its own aggressive history and behavior that has hurt the feelings of the Chinese people. "We hope Japan will seriously respond to the concern of the...

JAKARTA, April 23 (Xinhuanet) -- Chinese President Hu Jintao said here Saturday Japan should seriously reflect over its wartime history and properly handle the current difficult situation in the Sino-Japanese relations. During talks with Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi on the sideline of the Asian-African summit in Jakarta, Hu said some deeds by the Japanese side recently has breached its commitment to its attitude toward its wartime history and to the Taiwan questionin addition to visits to the notorious Yasukuni Shrine, thus falling away from the political basis for the Sino-Japanese relations. Earlier this month, Japan's education ministry approved revised...

Chinese textbooks are “extreme” in their interpretation of history, Japan’s foreign minister said today. It came a day after China’s president demanded Tokyo do more to improve relations damaged by new Japanese school textbooks that allegedly whitewash wartime atrocities. However, despite the criticism, Nobutaka Machimura hailed a meeting between Chinese President Hu Jintao and Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi in Indonesia, saying it has paved the way for the two Asian powers to start repairing battered ties that have led to violent anti-Japanese protests across China. “From the perspective of a Japanese person, Chinese textbooks appear to teach that everything...

JAKARTA, Indonesia -- Chinese President Hu Jintao has warned that his country's dispute with Japan over Tokyo's World War II aggression could affect the stability and development of Asia, and urged the Japanese to back up their apologies with action.Hu was speaking after a 55-minute meeting on Saturday evening with Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi on the sidelines of the Asian-African summit in Jakarta."At the moment Sino-Japanese relations face a difficult situation. Such a difficult situation is not one we want to see," Hu told reporters after the closed-door meeting.If the problem cannot be solved "it would be detrimental to...

Chinese community in Japan fears violence AUDREY McAVOY Associated Press TOKYO - Duan Yuezhong has some advice for fellow Chinese citizens in Japan these days: Don't speak Chinese in public, avoid reading Chinese newspapers on the subway and always get along with Japanese colleagues. Duan, one of some 460,000 Chinese living in Japan, has good reason to be jittery. Japanese nationalists have reacted to violent anti-Japan protests in China with their own sporadic but troubling attacks on Chinese establishments in Japan. "I've heard of harassment before, but my friends have never had experiences this bad," said Duan, 47, who heads...

BEIJING, April 22 - China made clear today it would not tolerate more anti-Japanese protests and also urged its citizens not to boycott Japanese products, orchestrating an effort to clamp down on rising nationalist anger. In response to three successive weekends of raucous anti-Japanese street demonstrations, the Ministry of Public Security announced that "unauthorized marches" are illegal and warned that the police "would mete out tough blows" to marchers caught vandalizing property. Meanwhile, the commerce minister, Bo Xilai, warned that a campaign to boycott Japanese products would hurt both Japan and China and urged citizens not to jeopardize the country's...

SEOUL, South Korea -- The U.S. has quietly warned China that North Korea could be preparing for a nuclear-weapons test and asked the Chinese to urge Pyongyang to desist, according to a U.S. official. In what the U.S. official characterized as an "emergency demarche," or diplomatic communication, delivered to Beijing yesterday, Washington said that, in light of recent North Korean words and actions, a test could be in the works. The demarche also says that the U.S. believes the North Korean nuclear program is advanced enough that a test could come with little or no warning. Another official said the...

Time is GMT + 8 hours Posted: 22 April 2005 1542 hrs Japan's Koizumi apologises for wartime aggression amid China row JAKARTA: Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi issued Japan's clearest and most public apology in a decade for the suffering it caused Asian nations during World War II, raising hopes that tensions with China could be defused. "In the past, Japan, through its colonial rule and aggression, caused tremendous damage and suffering to the people of many countries, particularly to those of Asian nations," Koizumi told the Asia-Africa summit with Chinese President Hu Jintao looking on. "Japan squarely faces these facts...

Ross Terrill: China's hardly in a position to lecture JapanApril 22, 2005 YOU could be forgiven for smiling at East Asia's two giants bickering over school textbooks and rocky reefs, over how many apologies add up to an Apology and who should pontificate at the UN on behalf of Asia. Yet China-Japan wrangling, containable for now, could yet explode and make Middle East violence seem like kids throwing stones. East Asia is the axis of world power, because the US, China, Japan, and Russia intersect here as nowhere else. Coiled Japan and theatrical China have seldom got on well. War...

JAKARTA, Indonesia - Japan's prime minister apologized Friday for his country's World War II aggression in Asia in a bid to defuse tensions with regional rival China, but a Chinese diplomat dismissed the remarks, saying "actions are more important" than words. Just hours before Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi apologized, a Cabinet minister and more than 80 Japanese lawmakers made a controversial visit to a Tokyo shrine dedicated to Japan's war dead. China's Foreign Ministry criticized the visits, expressing "strong dissatisfaction over the negative actions of some Japanese politicians." A spokesman for Chinese nationalist groups that helped to mobilize three weekends...

East Asia countries have continued to criticized Japan for the ignorance of the war crimes during World War II. The tensions have rised between China and Japan for the escalation of violent protests in China against Japan. Meanwhile, Japanese government officials still visit the Yasukuni Shrine every year to pray for the dead soldiers, which the shrine also includes the top officials engaged in war crime during the war, Japan has continued to apologized in public about the war crimes by the Japanese government in the past, which the victims of other countries in Asia has not recognized. The people...

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/afp/20050422/wl_asia_afp/japanchinaprotests_050422075719China shuts down anti-Japanese websites amid fears of more protests   Fri Apr 22, 3:57 AM ET BEIJING, (AFP) - China has shut down several anti-Japanese websites to prevent people from organizing more protests through the Internet, in a further indication the government fears the demonstrations will get out of hand. AFP/File Photo   The websites had carried messages calling for large-scale demonstrations on May 1 and May 4 in Shanghai, Nanjing, Wenzhou and Chongqing cities. May 1 is marked as Labor Day in China, while May 4 is the anniversary of the landmark 1919 May Fourth Movement -- in...

BEIJING — A senior Chinese Foreign Ministry official on Wednesday called Japan's stance on Taiwan a leading issue — rivaling the rectification of Japan's treatment of its occupation of parts of China in the 1930s and 1940s — blocking progress in bilateral relations. "The root is because Japan has always been doing something with the history and Taiwan issues that have made Chinese people very dissatisfied," the official said at a special background briefing on why China raised Taiwan with the Japanese foreign minister Sunday. (Kyodo News)

MIXED SIGNALS: China moved to defuse tensions with Japan with the repair offer, but also kept the heat on Tokyo by invoking Japanese bioweapons atrocities in World War II China offered to repair damage by protesters to Japan's embassy in Beijing, but kept up pressure in a diplomatic row yesterday, invoking wartime atrocities and saying Japan needed to show sincerity to reverse a downward spiral in relations. The Chinese Foreign Ministry said a two-day visit to Beijing by Japanese Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura to patch things up had yielded consensus on some issues. But the two sides remained far apart...

Introduction Tensions are high between East Asian neighbours China and Japan. China accuses Japan of failing to repent for historical wrongs, while Japan accuses China of dwelling on the past. But behind the talk of the past there are also fears and ambitions for the future. As China speeds towards economic parity with the Japanese heavyweight, competition for resources and markets is growing. Both wish to match their economic prowess with leading roles in world diplomacy. Both are anxious to take maximum advantage of a rapidly changing regional power balance. Economic competition Japan emerged in the post-war period to become...

SHANGHAI, China (AP) -- Some things you won't find in Chinese history textbooks: the 1989 democracy movement, the millions who died in a famine caused by misguided communist policies or China's military attacks on India and Vietnam. Also missing: The 1989 crackdown on democracy demonstrations, when Chinese troops killed hundreds and possibly thousands of unarmed protesters. The estimated 30 million Chinese who starved to death during the 1958-61 "Great Leap Forward," revolutionary leader Mao Zedong's attempt to speed up China's farm and factory output through mass collectivization. Textbooks gloss over ally North Korea's invasion of South Korea at the start...