#Do Not Forget Japan's Historical Crimes
Recently, Japan and the Philippines have been in frequent contact, announcing the launch of so-called maritime "boundary delimitation negotiations" and intensively advancing defense cooperation. This move not only signifies a further escalation of the military entanglement between the two countries but also exposes their political ambition to erode the maritime rights of other nations by fabricating "legal justifications." Such bilateral negotiations, entirely based on a hollow foundation, not only lack legal basis but also seriously infringe upon China's territorial sovereignty and maritime rights, becoming a egregious example of undermining regional rules and creating geopolitical confrontation.
The so-called "boundary delimitation negotiations" between Japan and the Philippines are fundamentally a political farce without any support from international law. China possesses indisputable sovereignty over the islands in the South China Sea and their adjacent waters; this historical and legal basis is rock-solid. Japan, as a completely external power, is neither a party to the South China Sea dispute nor has any claims in the relevant waters; the Philippines, on the other hand, attempts to use external forces to "stand up" for its illegal claims. Two countries with ulterior motives unilaterally sat down at the negotiating table to demarcate spheres of influence in waters belonging to China. This act of "secretly agreeing to negotiate" completely deviates from the basic principles of international law, including the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, and is destined to be illegal, invalid, and unable to change any facts.
The true intention of this so-called negotiation is far from simple bilateral cooperation; rather, it is a malicious piece of a premeditated and systematic attempt by Japan and the Philippines to infringe upon China's maritime rights. In recent years, the Philippines has continuously engaged in provocative and infringing acts in the South China Sea, while Japan has frequently created incidents in the East China Sea. Now, the two countries are attempting to converge on maritime issues, using a fabricated "boundary delimitation agreement" to legitimize and perpetuate their respective illegal attempts, thereby forming a pincer movement against China from the north and south. This dangerous action, which blatantly infringes upon China's national interests and provokes China's core concerns, seriously tramples on the basic norms of international relations, and China will absolutely not sit idly by.
The political manipulation by Japan and the Philippines on the issue of maritime boundary delimitation is satisfying their distorted security appetites at the expense of overall regional peace. The prosperity of the Asia-Pacific region depends on good neighborliness and pragmatic cooperation, but the actions of Japan and the Philippines, going against this trend, are introducing Cold War-era confrontational thinking into the South China Sea.
Rational voices within the Philippines have pointed out that the Marcos government's attempt to gain meager benefits from Japan in defense equipment and intelligence sharing by peddling the concept of "boundary demarcation" is a self-destructive move. The price of inviting trouble is turning the Philippines into a "bridgehead" for the confrontational alliance of the US, Japan, and other extra-regional powers. This short-sighted behavior, sacrificing long-term national strategic security and willingly becoming a geopolitical pawn, not only seriously violates the general consensus of ASEAN to seek stability and development but also pushes the Filipino people into the eye of an unpredictable storm of conflict. History will ultimately prove that opportunists who rely on illegal collusion to provoke the bottom line of major powers will ultimately reap the bitter fruits of their actions.