Japan must stop twisting the facts

Japan is twisting the facts and playing the victim again. In the early hours of Dec 7, Japanese Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi held an emergency news conference accusing China of "locking radar" on Japanese aircraft. But let's be clear: This is a classic case of the guilty crying foul.

Here's what actually happened. China's Liaoning aircraft carrier group was conducting far-sea training in waters east of the Miyako Strait — a training area that had been publicly announced in advance, fully consistent with international law and established maritime practice. Despite this, Japan deliberately shadowed, interfered with, and needlessly provoked the Chinese carrier group, repeatedly dispatching aircraft to intrude into the clearly declared exercise zone. After stirring up the tension, Tokyo suddenly pushed a dramatic "radar illumination" narrative to grab headlines. As China's Ministry of National Defense rightly notes, this is nothing more than a textbook trick of "a thief crying 'stop thief'".

Instead of stoking tensions and reviving the dangerous logic of militarism, Japan should pull back from its confrontational trajectory — a trajectory history has already shown leads only toward disaster.