BEIJING — China drove home its opposition to Japanese control of a contested group of islands Tuesday, with angry protests in dozens of cities and a warning from its defense minister that "further actions" were possible.
The demonstrations were large and sometimes angry, but they appeared to be much better controlled than protests over the weekend, which saw rioting and vandalism. Many Japanese businesses closed for the day Tuesday, but a strong police presence seemed to prevent damage.
The protesters objected to Japan's control of a group of islands in the East China Sea called Senkaku in Japanese and Diaoyu or Diaoyutai in Chinese. Japan has held the islands for more than a century, but many Chinese believe they should have been given to China after World War II.
In Beijing, several thousand people brought one of the city's diplomatic districts to a standstill as they swelled out from a key artery, the Third Ring Road, to beyond the Japanese Embassy. The police kept protesters separated into groups of 100 to 200 each; at the high point of the demonstration, in the early afternoon, streets were lined with at least 20 such groups, which took turns marching past the embassy.
As the day progressed, crowds threw rocks and water bottles at the well-guarded embassy compound. Some of the banners were crude, with strong sexual undertones that might have reflected the Japanese military's brutal wartime treatment of Chinese, including the systematic rape of Chinese women during its 14-year invasion and occupation of parts of the country. One banner showed a Chinese soldier castrating a Japanese soldier, while a popular image depicted Japan's national flag as a white tampon with a spot of blood in the middle.
Some foreigners were queried about their nationality, with Americans lectured for their country's military alliance with Japan. Foreign men were asked if they had Chinese girlfriends.
Although the protests clearly had government support — large-scale public demonstrations are extremely rare in China — many people came on their own and appeared to be genuinely angered at what they saw as Japan's failure to address its past behavior.
Tuesday was the 81st anniversary of the Mukden Incident, which marked the start of Japan's incursion into China and is sometimes referred to as the "day of national humiliation."
Zhang Dongxiao, a student at the University of International Business and Economics in Beijing, said he and a few classmates took the subway to the protest site to express their anger.
"Japan must fear China," he said, predicting demonstrations each year on the anniversary unless Japan gives up its claim to the islands.
Other protesters came from further afield. Members of one group of about 40, from Badong County in Hebei Province, said the county government had organized bus transportation but that the demonstrators had paid for it. The group walked along the road in front of the embassy yelling crude slogans, laughing and then circling back.
Some demonstrators were supported by patriotic business people who helped defray costs. A man who would only give his surname, Guo, from the city of Tangshan, said he found a group through an online bulletin board and took a bus that a local businessman had chartered.
"I protest to wake my fellow Chinese," Mr. Guo said. "If we can be more united, we can be unbeatable."
Many people carried their own handheld megaphones, but official loudspeakers droned a steady patter stating that the islands belonged to China and the government was working to get them back, and thanking people for behaving well.
More official pressure was also applied. A well-connected government think tank, the Council for National Security Policy Studies, which is headed by a retired general of the government's paramilitary force, said Japan should also give up the Ryukyu island chain. That chain stretches from southern Japan to Taiwan, and many Chinese see it as encircling China.
The defense minister, Gen. Liang Guanglie, used a visit by Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta to issue a stern warning. While holding open the possibility of a peaceful resolution to the island dispute, he warned that China reserved the right to undertake unspecified "further actions."
General Liang said the islands "have all along been China's inherent territory since ancient times, for which China has sufficient historical and jurisprudential evidence."
He characterized Japanese actions toward the islands as illegal. In recent weeks, the Japanese central government purchased some of the islands from private Japanese owners, arguing that nationalists would otherwise have bought them.
"The current escalation of tension over this dispute was totally caused by the Japanese side," General Liang said. "The Chinese people have every reason to feel more concerned, because it regards it as China's territory, after all."
During his visits this week to Tokyo and Beijing, Mr. Panetta has reiterated American policy, which is not to take sides in the region's territorial disputes and to urge a negotiated settlement.
Mr. Panetta said the United States was "urging calm and restraint by all sides," and was advocating "open channels of communication in order to resolve these disputes diplomatically and peacefully."
By JOHN MARKOFF 18 Sep, 2012
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Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/19/world/asia/china-warns-japan-over-island-dispute.html?partner=rss&emc=rss
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