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Japanese Flag Ripped from Diplomatic Vehicle in Beijing
Japanese Ambassador to China Uichiro Niwa (JIJI PRESS/AFP/GettyImages)
A car carrying Japan’s ambassador to China had the small flag attached to the hood violently torn from it on Monday in Beijing by an unidentified man.
The Japanese Embassy in Beijing said that Ambassador Uichiro Niwa was not injured in the incident, reported the Tokyo-based Kyodo news agency. But the flagpole was damaged, according to the Japan-based broadcaster NHK.
Japanese officials will file a “strong protest” with China’s foreign ministry over the matter, Kyodo said. Chinese state-run media have not reported on the incident.
Niwa was traveling back to the Japanese consulate Monday when two cars stopped his vehicle and a man jumped out and tore the flag asunder, the Japanese embassy told NHK.
The attack comes after around a week of protests erupted around China, which were triggered after pro-China activists sailed to the disputed Senkaku Islands and attempted to plant the Chinese flag there. Japan’s coast guard arrested the activists and deported them back to China.
The Chinese regime has asserted that the islands, called Diaoyu in Chinese, belong to it, but Japan has said it has governed them since they were handed over by the United States in the 1970s. Waters around the rocky, uninhabited islands are said to have natural gas and fishing spots.
During the protests, Chinese demonstrators attacked Japanese-made cars, burned Japanese flags, and threw objects at Japanese businesses in several cities. Chinese state-run media has also been on the offensive against Japan and, on a near-daily basis, has said Japan should relinquish control over the Senkakus.
It has been speculated that such protests could not take place throughout China unless the regime had allowed it to happen. In China, protests against the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) or its policies are usually swiftly quashed by police and security forces.
The regime however reserves the right to clamp down on such protests, if, for example, it fears that demonstrators could turn against the CCP, according to global intelligence firm Stratfor in an analysis last week.
“Beijing has long tolerated–if not facilitated–public expressions of nationalism, particularly when they are anti-Japan,” the company said. “The Chinese government also uses these nationalist protests to distract the public from other issues,” it added.
However, the CCP will likely crack down if they “grow too large and coordinated,” pointing out that Chinese demonstrators and Internet users “have blamed the Chinese government for not acting to protect the arrested activists,” the analysis said.
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2012-08-28 20:52:33
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