Oct 9

Consulate General of Japan in New York: “Current Situation of the Senkaku Islands”

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The below was sent by the Japan Information Center, an agency of the Consulate General of Japan in New York:

The Japan Information Center, Consulate General of Japan in New York, would like to brief you on the “Current Situation of the Senkaku Islands” as follows:

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Current Situation of Senkaku Islands

Dear Friends,

In recent months, the geography of Japan has been challenged, historical maps disputed. Last month witnessed the General Assembly sessions where international matters were discussed and debated. Of grave interest to Japan, the Chinese Foreign Minister made China’s own assertion on the sovereignty issue of the Senkaku Islands in his general debate.

We at the Japan Information Center in New York wish to take this opportunity to present to you a few key historical facts about the issue so that you can have a clear and accurate understanding of the matter.

The Senkaku Islands, a chain of five small islands and rocks in the East China Sea, has been an inherent territory of Japan since it first established territorial sovereignty in 1895. The Japanese government established territorial sovereignty of the islands with a cabinet decision in 1895, after a decade of government surveys which confirmed that the Senkakau Islands had been uninhabited, with no trace of having been under the control of the Qing Dynasty of China.

Since that time, the Senkaku Islands have been an integral part of the Nansei Shoto/Okinawa Islands of Japan. They were never part of the Formosa (Taiwan) or the Pescadore Islands, which were ceded to Japan by the Qing Dynasty of China in May of 1895 as part of the Treaty of Shimonoseki. Under the post-World War II San Francisco Peace Treaty in 1951, the Senkaku Islands –which were not included as territories Japan renounced – were placed under the administration of the United States as part of the Nansei Shoto/Okinawa Islands, with administrative rights returning to Japan in 1971.

Japan has effectively controlled the Senkaku Islands since 1895 by exercising administrative duties such as patrol and law enforcement and the levying of taxes on the private owners of the islands.

China and Taiwan began making their own assertions on territorial sovereignty over the Senkaku Islands only from 1971 when the question of the development of petroleum resources on the continental shelf of the East China Sea arose. China and Taiwan had not, prior to that point, raised any objection to Japan’s sovereignty over the Senkaku Islands’ in 75 years. No complaints were made at crucial junctures in the post-World War II history; not in 1945 when Taiwan, without the inclusion of the Senkaku Islands, was freed from Japan, nor in 1951 at the post-World War II drafting of the San Francisco Peace Treaty when administrative rights for the islands were placed from Japan to the United States. In fact, Chinese publications have acknowledged the Senkaku Islands as being a part of Japan, one recent example being a 1953 article titled “The Struggle Against U.S. Occupation by the People of the Ryukyu Islands” in the national newspaper published by China’s Communist Party, the People’s Daily, which clearly defined the Senkaku Islands as being a part of the Japanese Ryukyu Islands.

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