Wednesday Dec 11, 2024
Wednesday Dec 11, 2024
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Obama’s remarks, aimed at reassuring Japan and other allies, set against a robust commentary from China’s state news agency Xinhua that also called the United States “myopic”, demonstrate the delicate balancing act Obama faces on a week-long Asia tour.
The four-nation trip that starts in Tokyo later on Wednesday comes at a time of rising tension in the region, and as the United States urges Japan’s unpredictable neighbour North Korea not to conduct another nuclear test.
Obama, who will be making the first full state visit to Japan by a US President since 1996, must assuage worries by Tokyo and other allies that his commitment to their defence in the face of an increasingly assertive China is weak, without hurting vital US ties with Asia’s biggest economy.
Noting Beijing and Washington could work together on issues such as North Korea’s nuclear program, Obama told the Yomiuri newspaper, in written remarks: “In other words, we welcome the continuing rise of a China that is stable, prosperous and peaceful and plays a responsible role in global affairs.”
He added: “And our engagement with China does not and will not come at the expense of Japan or any other ally.”
Such assurances are likely to be high on the agenda when Obama meets Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at a symbolic summit on Thursday.
Japan, whose ties with rival China have chilled over the past two years, has been beset by anxiety over the degree to which reality matches rhetoric in Obama’s promised “pivot” of US military and diplomatic assets to Asia.
China, for its part, fears the US is pursuing a policy of containment through its network of Asian allies, several of whom have long-standing territorial disputes with Beijing in the East and South China Seas.
Wednesday’s Xinhua commentary criticised US policy in the region as “a carefully calculated scheme to cage the rapidly developing Asian giant”.
“The United States should reappraise its anachronistic hegemonic alliance system and stop pampering its chums like Japan and the Philippines that have been igniting regional tensions with provocative moves,” it said.
Treaty obligations
Obama and Abe are expected to send a message of solidarity after strains following Abe’s December visit to Tokyo’s Yasukuni Shrine, seen by critics as a symbol of Japan’s past militarism.
Obama also assured Japan that tiny isles in the East China Sea at the heart of a territorial row with China are covered by a bilateral security treaty that obligates America to come to Japan’s defence. That is long-stated US policy, but the confirmation by the president is likely to be welcome in Japan.
“The policy of the United States is clear - the Senkaku islands are administered by Japan and therefore fall within the scope of the US-Japan Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security,” Obama said, using the Japanese name for the islands that are known as the Diaoyu in China, which also claims them.
“And we oppose any unilateral attempts to undermine Japan’s administration of these islands,” he said.
Japanese and Chinese naval vessels and coastguard ships have played cat-and-mouse around the disputed islets since Japan’s government bought the then-privately owned territory in 2012.
A joint statement to be issued at the summit will state the two allies will not tolerate any attempt to change the status quo by force - a phrase that implicitly targets China - but likely not mention the islands or China by name, Japanese media have reported.
Nuclear North Korea
Obama also reaffirmed Washington’s commitment to the security of South Korea, and said it would stand firm in its insistence that a nuclear North Korea was unacceptable.
Seoul is the second stop on Obama’s four-nation swing, which also includes Malaysia and the Philippines.
“The burden is on Pyongyang to take concrete steps to abide by its commitments and obligations, and the United States, Japan and South Korea are united in our goal - the complete denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula,” Obama said.
North Korea, already subject to United Nations’ sanctions over its previous atomic tests, the third and most recent of which took place in early 2013, threatened last month to conduct what it call “a new form of nuclear test”.
On Monday its KCNA news agency quoted a foreign ministry spokesman saying Obama’s trip was a “reactionary and dangerous one as it is aimed to escalate confrontation and bring dark clouds of a nuclear arms race to hang over this unstable region”.
The United States said on Tuesday it was watching the Korean peninsula closely after news reports quoted the South Korean Government as saying that heightened activity had been detected at North Korea’s underground nuclear test site.
“We continue to urge North Korea to refrain from actions that threaten regional peace and security and to comply with its international obligations and commitments,” State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki told a regular briefing.
US-Japan relations were strained after Abe in December visited the Yasukuni Shrine, where wartime leaders convicted as war criminals by an Allied tribunal are honoured along with war dead. The visit prompted a US statement of “disappointment”.
Abe has since sought to soothe US concerns that his conservative agenda to recast wartime history with a less apologetic tone is blocking improved ties with Seoul and giving China ammunition to paint him as reviving past militarism.
China calls on US to not take sides in territorial disputesREUTERS: China called on the United States on Wednesday to respect its promises not to take sides in territorial disputes, after US President Barack Obama said that islands at the centre of a dispute between Japan and China fall within the scope of the US-Japan security treaty. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang made the remarks at a daily news briefing. |
