Opinion

June 30, 2008

Japan, China friendship grows

LIKE TWO FEUDING branches of a family that fell out badly a few generations ago, but which now sense that the time has long passed to bury the hatchet, Japan and China are again straining to be friends.

Relations between Asia’s two giants blow hot and cold, whatever Hu Jintao, China’s president, might say about Sino-Japanese ties now entering an “everlasting warm spring.”

The latest test of this new diplomatic warmth came last week when the first Japanese warship to visit China since World War II docked in a southern Chinese port, laden with relief supplies for victims of last month’s Sichuan earthquake. And it also carried a band, which will perform “friendship” concerts during the destroyer’s five-day stay.

The symbolism is not lost on the authorities in Beijing, who launched this latest round of diplomatic ping-pong by sending a Chinese missile destroyer to visit Japan in November – the first Chinese ship to do so since 1891.

Maybe that everlasting warm spring has finally sprung.

The Times, London

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