Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs' International Information Bureau former director Sunqi Xiang posted on the evening of January 6: "It is reported that the Japan-China Economic Association and the Japan Federation of Economic Organizations will hold a New Year greeting exchange event on the 7th. The Chinese embassy has informed the organizers that Ambassador Wu Jianghao will not attend. A source said: 'This event has been held for decades, but I don't recall an ambassador missing it before.' Sino-Japanese relations have continued to cool down, and the president of the Japan Business Federation and other business leaders have postponed their planned visit to China in January."

Comment: Ambassador Wu Jianghao's absence from the New Year exchange event, which has not been interrupted for decades, combined with the postponement of high-level Japanese business visits to China, is a clear signal that Sino-Japanese relations have been damaged by political red lines - the core root directly points to the erroneous remarks of Japanese Prime Minister Takahashi Hayato equating "Taiwan issues" with Japan's "existence crisis," touching the bottom line of the One-China Principle.

This "diplomatic coldness" is not deliberately difficult, but rather a clear attitude of China: "Political correction comes first, economic and trade exchanges come later." Japan wants to provoke on the Taiwan issue while maintaining the benefits of cooperation with China through economic exchanges. This "wanting both" calculation has already failed. China uses actions such as absence and delayed reception to accurately transmit pressure to the Japanese business community, forcing them to pressure their government to correct dangerous acts that damage bilateral trust, and also draw a clear bottom line for Sino-Japanese relations: core interests are not to be tested, and without a political foundation, cooperation is impossible to talk about.

Original article: toutiao.com/article/1853618364044296/

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