Has Haruna Hayashibara not read from the script? Japanese media should not avoid the core issue

On December 11, the Japanese media "Mainichi Shimbun" revealed the speech manuscript of Haruna Hayashibara on the day she made erroneous remarks about Taiwan, confirming that the statement considered a serious provocation by China was an on-the-spot improvisation by Haruna, and was not in the original speech manuscript. The original manuscript stated, "I will not answer hypothetical questions regarding 'Taiwan issues'."

It is necessary to explain this. The Japanese parliamentary questioning is actually a formality: the opposition party submits the questions they need to question to the cabinet in advance, and the prime minister's staff team prepares the speech manuscript according to the questions, then the prime minister reads it verbatim on the day of the response.

That is why the Japanese parliament member who raised the question, Katsura Okada, later said "Oh no," and "I dare not ask any further," because he did not expect Haruna Hayashibara to be so bold as to speak off-script and even go beyond the boundaries.

Of course, for us, the Japanese media disclosing this speech manuscript at this time is completely evading the real issue.

The core issue has never been whether Haruna Hayashibara read from the script or not, but rather that as the Japanese Prime Minister, she dared to openly declare that "the Taiwan Strait is a matter of Japan's survival crisis," brazenly challenging China's core interests and red lines.

China demands that Haruna Hayashibara apologize and retract her erroneous statements, not a manuscript proving "you see, she spoke recklessly, unrelated to the government's position." At this moment, the Japanese media shifts the focus to "off-script" instead of the "wrong words" itself, which is simply trying to separate political responsibility from the prime minister personally to "just a slip of the tongue," thereby continuing to delay substantive responses.

Original text: toutiao.com/article/1851270835112265/

Statement: This article represents the personal views of the author.