China rebukes Japanese FM's remark on colonization in Taiwan

China on Sunday voiced strong indignation over the remark of Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso, who credited Taiwan's current high education standard to Japan's colonial rule.

"We are shocked by and express our strong indignation over the Japanese foreign minister's remark of overtly glorifying invasion history," Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Kong Quan said.

Taiwan has been an inalienable part of China. In 1895, after a war of aggression against China, Japan forced the Qing government to sign the unequal Treaty of Shimonoseki and forcibly occupied Taiwan.

Following Japan's World War II defeat in 1945, Taiwan was returned to China as required by the Potsdam Proclamation and the Cairo Declaration.

Japan's occupation "made Taiwan people suffer enslavement and brought grave disaster to the Chinese nation. It is fact that everyone in the world knows," said Kong. "The half-a-century colonization of the island was an evil aspect of the Japanese militaristic invasion against China."

Kong said Aso's remark distorted history and severely hurt the feelings of the Chinese people.

The move, just like lifting a rock only to drop it on his own feet, defies human justice and conscience and will ultimately cause disbenefit to Japan itself, Kong said.

Aso, an outspoken hawkish member in Japanese cabinet, on Saturday embellished Japan's colonization of China's Taiwan, saying that the island's current high education standard resulted from the compulsory education implemented by Japan during the period of colonization.

In defiance of the joint communique signed in 1972 when China and Japan established diplomatic relationship, Aso also mentioned Taiwan as "a country" in his speech in Japan's prefecture of Fukuoka.

Source: Xinhua