Japan sees ‘grave concern’ in Beijing’s East China Sea actions

Bloomberg

China’s projection of its military might into Asian waters and North Korea’s modernisation of its ballistic-missile arsenal pose risks to Japanese and regional security, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said.
In its annual white paper released on Tuesday, the ministry accused China of “relentlessly’ pushing its way towards uninhabited East China Sea islands claimed by the two countries, saying it was becoming “a matter of grave concern.” The ministry also accused China of spreading disinformation about Covid-19.
The Defense of Japan white paper comes after fresh ripples between Japan and its sole
military ally, the US, following Tokyo’s decision last month to drop deployment plans for a $5 billion Lockheed Martin Corp missile-defense system.
The Trump administration has sought more money from Japan and other countries that host US troops. Despite those hiccups, the US has still found Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to be one of the staunchest supporters of President Donald Trump’s security policies, including those for China and North Korea. Abe has spent much of his almost eight-year tenure trying to repair ties with China while maintaining Japan’s postwar alliance with the US.
“China is steadily increasing its capabilities to conduct operations in more distant seas,” the yearly defense paper said. The paper compiled over several months reaffirmed Japan’s position on the South China Sea, where it said Beijing was pushing forward with militarisation and “continuing unilateral attempts to change the status quo by coercion to create a fait accompli.”
China said it had lodged a “stern representations” to Japan.
The defense paper “is full of bias and disinformation against China,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told a daily briefing in Beijing. “It paints China as a threat. It is named a white paper but it is indeed a paper of accusations, which exposes certain forces’ ill intentions in Japan.”
The Japanese report follows a Pentagon assessment that determined China to be advancing military and territorial footholds in the South China Sea. The Trump administration rejected China’s expansive maritime claims in that water body, reversing a previous policy of not taking sides in such disputes.
“We are making clear: Beijing’s claims to offshore resources across most of the South China Sea are completely unlawful, as is its campaign of bullying to control them,” US Secretary of State Michael Pompeo said. “The world will not allow Beijing to treat the South China Sea as its maritime empire.”
Japan reiterated that it believed China could use its global Belt and Road infrastructure initiative to push its People’s Liberation Army into the Indian and Pacific Ocean regions.