FM dismisses Japanese envoy's remarks as "unreasonable"

BEIJING - Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying on Tuesday rejected Japanese Ambassador to Britain Keiichi Hayashi's recent remarks on China as "ignorant, unreasonable and arrogant."

Hua made the comment at a regular press briefing when asked to respond to Hayashi's article, "China risks becoming Asia's Voldemort," which was published in The Telegraph on Sunday.

Liu Xiaoming, China's ambassador to Britain -- also making reference to the "Harry Potter" villain -- wrote in The Telegraph on January 1: "If militarism is like the haunting Voldemort of Japan, the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo is a kind of horcrux, representing the darkest parts of that nation's soul."

Hayashi responded and wrote in The Telegraph, "there are two paths open to China. One is to seek dialogue, and abide by the rule of law. The other is to play the role of Voldemort in the region by letting loose the evil of an arms race and escalation of tensions, although Japan will not escalate the situation from its side."

Hua reminded people to remember two facts. First, historically it was Japan that started the war of militarism aggression and brought calamities to the people of China and other countries in the region.

In China alone, Japan's aggressive war caused more than 35 million casualties, she said.

Japanese militarism's crimes against its neighboring countries in history are too numerous to record and cannot be denied and wiped out by anyone, she said.

Militarism still haunts Japan, said Hua, noting that the Japanese leaders paid homage at the war-linked Yasukuni Shrine, which overtly flaunts the belief that Japan's aggressive war was justified.

The second fact is that the population of China is more than 10 times that of Japan and the area of China is about 26 times that of Japan, yet China's per capita military spending is only one-fifth of Japan's, said Hua. The spokeswoman added that this makes it clear to everyone who is expanding military build-up and threatening security.

Noting that militarism aggression is the darkest evil in Japan's history, the spokeswoman urged the country to face up to and overcome the evil in its history and mentality, so as to win the trust of its Asian neighbors and the international community.

"Otherwise, Japan will continue to stand in the dock of history," she said.