TOKYO (AP) — Japan has voiced serious concerns following live-fire drills conducted by a Chinese navy destroyer near a remote Japanese island in the Pacific Ocean on Sunday, during a joint military exercise with Russia, officials confirmed Tuesday.
The Chinese Luyang III-class guided-missile destroyer carried out the firing exercise off Okinotori, Japan’s southernmost island, just hours after the Japanese navy observed it operating alongside two other Chinese warships and a Russian frigate, according to Japan’s Joint Staff.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Minoru Kihara told reporters Tuesday that Japan communicated its concerns to China, warning that the live-fire activity posed a potential safety risk to ships operating in the area. He noted that vessels nearby received a warning notice from the Chinese warships shortly before the drills began.
“We will continue to watch China-Russia operations around Japan with concern, while doing utmost for the warning and surveillance of the Japanese airspace and territorial waters,” Kihara said.
Japanese Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi, speaking Monday during an address in Britain, said the incident highlighted “the deepening military cooperation between China and Russia.” He also pointed to a ballistic missile launch from a Chinese submarine earlier this month and at least 10 joint flights by Chinese and Russian bombers in airspace around Japan.
Japan has grown increasingly alarmed by China’s expanding military footprint in the Pacific. That concern intensified last year when two Chinese aircraft carriers were spotted nearly simultaneously operating near Iwo Jima, another southern Japanese island — a first that fueled Tokyo’s unease about Beijing’s military reach far from its own shores.
Sunday’s live-fire drills took place 180 kilometers — roughly 110 miles — southwest of Okinotori island and within Japan’s Exclusive Economic Zone, the maritime zone beyond a nation’s immediate territorial waters where it holds rights over natural resources.
China previously announced that its joint naval exercises with Russia concluded on July 13, and that some participating ships were conducting joint patrols in the Pacific. It remains unclear why those patrols would involve live-fire activity, as Japan has claimed.
China’s state-run Xinhua News Agency reported that live-fire exercises were held off the port city of Qingdao on China’s eastern coast — a location far from the uninhabited Okinotori island, which lies in the Philippine Sea.
China’s Defense Ministry spokesperson Jiang Bin said in remarks posted online late last week that military cooperation between China and Russia plays an important role in protecting both nations’ sovereignty and security, as well as maintaining peace and stability in the region.
“We hope that relevant parties can view China-Russia military cooperation objectively and rationally, and stop making groundless speculation and cease smearing and hyping,” Jiang said.
China also disputes Japan’s claim to an Exclusive Economic Zone around Okinotori, arguing the landmass is an atoll rather than an island.
Japan’s Joint Staff stated this was the first time it had publicly disclosed detecting Chinese live-fire drills within Japan’s EEZ, though it acknowledged the activity did not violate international law.
The Joint Staff also noted that the same group of four Chinese and Russian warships had previously sailed southward through the waters between Japan’s main islands of Okinawa and Miyako.
