Senkaku Islands and Ishihara-kun

[Curt 1]

Ishihara seems to like doing this kind of thing just to piss people (esp. sweet if it's gaijin!) off.

 

What's going on with this lot?

 

Controversial Tokyo Gov Shintaro Ishihara has said Tokyo will buy a small chain of uninhabited islands at the center of a damaging territorial dispute with China.

 

Ishihara, an outspoken critic of Beijing, has made a career out of provocative nationalistic remarks. He said he has approached the owner of the islands in the East China Sea, called Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyou in China.

 

“Tokyo has decided to buy them. Tokyo will defend the Senkaku islands,” he told the conservative Heritage Foundation in Washington on Monday.

 

If realized, the move would mark a new stage in the long-rumbling dispute over the islands, which sit around 2,000 kilometers from Tokyo in rich fishing grounds that may harbor lucrative energy resources.

 

Ishihara said he had begun negotiations to purchase Uotsurijima, Kitakojima and Minamikojima islands in the uninhabited island chain, which is owned by a Japanese family and leased to the Japanese government.

 

The islands are owned by the Kurihara family who bought them decades ago from descendants of the previous Japanese owners.

 

The online edition of the conservative Sankei Shimbun reported that the owners had agreed to sell to the Tokyo government.

 

Ishihara will hold hearings with experts and seek the agreement of the local legislature in his bid to buy the islands when the annually-renewable leases to the national government expire at the end of March, the Sankei said.

 

Any move by a public body to claim ownership of the islands is likely to inflame tensions with China, which vigorously claims them as its own.

[@tokyo 14]

He's always good for a headline isn't he.

[grungy-gonads 54]

These islands are rather close to Tokyo, perhaps he's thinking about building a bridge.

 

Really dislike that dude.

[Tubby Beaver 209]

hope he goes and lives on the bloody islands

[Metabo Oyaji 71]

I wonder how Tokyoites feel about their tax money being spent on this.

Of course, they're the ones who keep electing Blinky the Clown...

[@tokyo 14]

There's something 'evil' about that man.

[@tokyo 14]

PS I didn't vote for him

[MooMoo 0]

I don't think high percentage of people vote. They should and vote him away. I do not like his attitude at all.

[pie-eater 207]

Blinky the Clown...

 

Good one.

 

It would be funny if one of his offspring turned out to be an uber-liberal gay who was bonking a gaijin, and adopted some foreign children (at least one being Chinese).... or something like that.

You would see the steam coming out of his head.

[klingon 10]

You can see in his eyes and manners just how much he loves to stir the shit, especially when it involves China or Another Foreign Country.

 

See his little "salute" on his interviews at the airport yesterday?

[grungy-gonads 54]

He definitely gets off on it.

[DoctorOctopus 2]

The islands are owned by the Kurihara family who bought them decades ago from descendants of the previous Japanese owners.

 

If so, how come the Chinese claim them. And I read somewhere the Taiwanese as well.

 

Wonder how much islands cost these days.

[pie-eater 207]

You know what, one of them looks like Dr Evil's hideaway.

 

Let's comparing!

 

Dr Evil's hideaway:

 

 

Senkaku Islands:

 

[griller 9]

The same!

[ProbablyaCrazyPerson 2]

Thousands of protesters took to the streets across China, attacking Japanese-made cars and smashing windows of Japanese-owned businesses, after activists from Japan landed on a disputed island at the centre of an escalating territorial spat between Beijing and Tokyo.

The Chinese foreign ministry rebuked Tokyo after campaigners arrived on the East China Sea islet, waving Japanese flags.

Activists from Hong Kong visited the islands last week to press China's claim, but were arrested and deported by Japan.

Japan controls the archipelago, which it calls the Senkaku, but the islands are also claimed by China and Taiwan, which know them as the Diaoyu.

The East China Sea contains valuable energy reserves and fisheries and the row is complicated by long-running historical tensions. Many in China complain that Japan has failed to fully acknowledge or atone for wartime atrocities; in Japan, there is growing anxiety over China's increasing military might.

Up to 2,000 people with Chinese flags and banners protested in the southern city of Shenzhen, overturning Japanese cars, attacking Japanese restaurants and burning images of Japanese flags. Qingdao, Taiyuan and Hangzhou also saw protests, while smaller ones took place in several more cities across China, from far northern Harbin to south-western Chengdu. In Guangzhou and Shenyang, protesters gathered at the Japanese consulates.

There were similar protests two years ago after Japan detained a Chinese captain when his fishing boat hit one of its patrol vessels. But Sunday's outcry appeared to be the largest since 2005, when tens of thousands marched over several weekends. Chinese authorities have been markedly more tolerant of nationalist protest than of other activism in the past.

The protests came after about 10 Japanese nationalists from a flotilla of 100 boats swam ashore at Uotsori, one of the islands, and waved Japanese flags.

"Four days ago there was an illegal landing of Chinese people on the island and as such we need to solidly reaffirm our own territory," Koichi Mukoyama, a conservative MP aboard one of the boats, told AP.

"This is a way of saying to not mess around," Toshio Tamogami, one of the group's leaders, told Reuters.

The Japanese government had denied the group permission to land on the islands. Coastguard vessels were nearby and officials later questioned the activists.

The territorial dispute heated up after the nationalist governor of Tokyo proposed that the city buy the islands, which are privately owned. The central government then said it would buy them.

 

See what I started!?

[grungy-gonads 54]

You troublemaker!

[ProbablyaCrazyPerson 2]

he he

[xxx 2]

Those islands would make a good Bond bad guy hideout.

 

Or Dr Evil.

[oblivion 5]

Ishihara could be dr evil

[Chriselle 158]

This is really all SO silly.

[ProbablyaCrazyPerson 2]

He's a lovely man, really.

[frannyo 2]

There's loads of goats on them there islands.

Cool.

[xxx 2]

I see we (taxpayers) are going to be buying them.

 

No-one asked me!

 

[2pints-mate 0]

Does he want to be PM? Can he be?

 

Tokyo's governor Shintaro Ishihara is resigning to form a new national political party, ahead of expected general elections in Japan.

 

"As of today, I will resign as the Tokyo governor," he told reporters.

 

The 80-year-old, serving his fourth term as governor, is known for making provocative comments.

 

Earlier this year, he sparked off a row when he said he would use public money to buy a group of islands at the centre of a dispute between China and Japan.

 

The novelist-turned-politician, who began his current term as governor only last April, said he wants to return to national politics.

 

He said he would be founding a party with other right-wing politicians to challenge the two dominant parties in polls that must be called by the end of next year.

 

He blamed Japan's current economic and political problems on the government and compared the administration to the rule of the shogun, referring to the hereditary commanders-in-chief in feudal Japan.

 

"We must change the inflexible rule of the central government bureaucrats," Mr Ishihara said.

[snowbender 3]

Bloody ace.

 

I can't believe Japan wants that 80 year old in charge. He seems intent on simply being controversial.