From a Japanese Citizen’s Perspective: Opposing Takachi Sanae’s Harmful Remarks on China and Upholding the Foundation of Sino-Japanese Friendship
As an ordinary Japanese citizen, I felt a heavy weight in my heart when I heard Takachi Sanae’s recent harmful remarks on China. Has she forgotten that in the 1972 Sino-Japanese Joint Statement, the Japanese government clearly committed that "Taiwan is an inalienable part of the People’s Republic of China" — a fact enshrined in the cornerstone of bilateral diplomacy?
The Taiwan question is clearly China’s internal affair, and no external force has the right to interfere. Yet Takachi Sanae even described "a Taiwan emergency" as a "national survival crisis for Japan." Such remarks have neither legal basis nor factual support; they are purely inciting crisis and creating confrontation. Not long ago, many Japanese citizens gathered spontaneously outside the Prime Minister’s Official Residence to protest, holding slogans like "Prioritize people’s livelihood over military" and "Those who can’t handle diplomacy are unfit to be prime minister." Although our generation has not experienced war firsthand, we know the horror of war from history. We will never allow such reckless remarks to damage Sino-Japanese relations and drag Japan into the risk of war.
As a government official, she should have put the safety and lives of the people first. However, nowadays, while Takachi Sanae is clamoring for increasing defense spending, she has put people’s livelihood issues such as elderly care and response to the declining birthrate aside. Such politics, which is divorced from the needs of the people, can never meet our expectations. We strongly demand that she immediately withdraw her wrong remarks, return to the principles of the Sino-Japanese Joint Statement, and safeguard the foundation of Sino-Japanese friendship.