Opinion - News Analysis   

President Hu in Japan: symbolism and substance

Cherry blossoms are painting swirls of colour across North East Asia as Chinese President Hu Jintao embarks on a landmark five-day visit to Japan on Tuesday, May 6. Speaking to reporters ahead of his trip, Mr. Hu made an allusion to the seasonal omen, saying that he hoped his interaction with his Japanese counterparts would take place in the ambience of a “warm spring.”

The visit marks many firsts. It is the first visit by a Chinese head of state to Japan in a decade. It will be Mr. Hu’s longest official trip to a country since he took office in 2003. In addition, it is his first foray abroad since the protests in Tibet in mid-March.

The visit throws into relief the enormously complex relationship between Asia’s two most powerful countries. Sino-Japanese ties remain embittered by history and complicated by modern rivalries but are knit by intricate economic linkages. The import of the bilateral engagement between China and Japan, moreover, transcends their borders; it has implications for the stability, security, and economic future of the entire region. It also provides critical insights into the process by which economic integration can ensure limits to political conflict even between countries that suffer from a trust deficit.

Mr. Hu’s visit comes at a time when Sino-Japanese ties have been for almost two years recovering from the trough they were in during Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi’s tenure from 2001 to 2006. During this time Beijing refrained from any high-level contact with Japan, in protest against Mr. Koizumi’s repeated visits to the Yasukuni shrine.

The shrine is a war memorial that commemorates Japanese soldiers who died in various wars, including 14 leaders convicted as Class A war criminals. To Beijing, Mr. Koizumi’s visits to Yasukuni symbolised a lack of remorse on the part of the Japanese for the atrocities they committed in China during their invasion of the country before the Second World War.

The “history question,” as Japan’s invasion of China is referred to bilaterally, flared up violently in April 2005, when attacks on Japanese diplomatic missions and business establishments took place in a number of Chinese cities. The anti-Japanese protests followed the publication of new textbooks in Japan that Beijing alleged deliberately glossed over the country’s war-time atrocities against China.

Mr. Koizumi’s successors Shinzo Abe and current Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda have since been able to mend fences with China to an extent. Mr. Fukuda’s assurance that he would not visit Yasukuni while in office, has in particular gone some way in putting the “history question” on the backburner.

However, other contentious bilateral issues continue to simmer, leaving open the possibility that one or more of them might bubble over into open acrimony. The two countries are, for example, embroiled in a dispute over gas-field exploration rights in the East China Sea. Marathon rounds of negotiations have failed to yield any results.

Beijing also continues to oppose Japan’s bid for a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council even as Tokyo is against the lifting of the European Union’s arms embargo against China.

With a rising China spreading its wings in what was till recently Tokyo’s neck of the woods, the geo-strategic rivalry between the two countries is sharp. In response to Beijing’s courting of ASEAN and South Asian countries which it pursues through a mix of economic incentives, Japan too has begun to develop a robust foreign policy.

Thus, in recent years Tokyo has not only reiterated its commitment to its traditional alliance with the United States, but has also sought out new partnerships with India and Australia while redoubling efforts to build stronger economic and security ties with ASEAN.

Japan’s signing of a security pact with Australia last year, for example, was seen by some analysts as a move aimed to contain China, as was its participation in the quadrilateral initiative — a dialogue between Japan, India, the U.S. and Australia. Japan views China’s increasing military build-up with trepidation. Reports by the Japanese Defence Ministry have in recent years projected China’s growing influence in Asia as a threat to Japan’s national security. Tokyo has also repeatedly alleged that China’s military modernisation programme lacks transparency.

At the same time, economic and business ties between the two countries continue to gallop. China displaced the United States as Japan’s top trade partner last year. The two-way trade amounts to $236.6 billion — up 12 per cent from 2006. Even as Sino-Japanese political ties have suffered a crisis, as during the 2005 anti-Japanese protests in China, the economic linkages have remained strong. That year bilateral trade was worth a considerable $189.4 billion.

In fact, the economic relationship ultimately helps apply the brakes on any conflict before it becomes serious enough to threaten the considerable benefits to both economies that their engagement brings. China is very important to Japan’s economic recovery.

China, in turn, depends to a large extent on Japanese technology and investment to achieve its economic aspirations. Moreover, Beijing realises that any conflict with Japan would destabilise the region with detrimental effects on its domestic developmental goals.

Sino-Japanese ties are thus characterised by a certain malaise that dictates the need for cooperation, even as historical mistrust and geopolitical competition place constraints on the contours of this cooperation. The bottomline, however, remains to be economic growth. So, Mr. Hu’s Japan visit will focus on soothing fears and allaying apprehensions rather than on pursuing historical recriminations or other thorny disputes.

In addition to formal talks with Mr. Fukuda, the Chinese President’s five days in Japan will be spent chatting with university students, dining with Emperor Akihito in the Imperial Palace, playing friendly ping-pong games and discussing a loan of giant pandas to the Tokyo zoo.

Mr. Hu’s visit will thus be one where the symbolism itself forms the substance. No breakthroughs on contentious issues are expected, nor are any big-ticket deals likely. Instead, the trip will try to accomplish the infinitely more delicate task of asserting the truth that there are many shades of grey that lie between the black and white of any ally and enemy.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Stories in this Section

Necessary compromise
Regulatory overhaul needed
Reservations on the road: pause, reflect & learn
President Hu in Japan: symbolism and substance
Satellites built by universities
Corrections and clarifications
Outrageous
Creating an icon
On corruption

Copyright © 2008, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu