Japan’s hopes to contain China laughable

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe kicks off his first trip after taking office to Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia today. Global media all connect his trip with the intense state of the Sino-Japanese relationship. They consider that the purpose of this action is to contain China. Even some people in Japan shouted that they want to "encircle China."

Reuters - Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe (L) and his Vietnamese counterpart Nguyen Tan Dung review the guard of honour during a welcoming ceremony at the Presidential Palace in Hanoi January 16, 2013

Encircling China? Those people may not know what they are talking about. Some people in Japan seem like paranoids who expect that China can be encircled. Some Japanese politicians are also not sober enough, such as Abe, who raised the proposal of "the arc of freedom and prosperity" in his previous term.

According to the Sankei Shimbun, Abe raised another strategy, suggesting that Australia, India, Japan, and the US Hawaii form a diamond to safeguard the maritime commons stretching from the Indian Ocean region to East China Sea. Areas such as China's Diaoyu Islands and South China Sea islands are all encircled by it. Sankei Shimbun said that the strategy is raised to contain China which is increasingly active in the ocean.

China is too large for this. It will be a joke in international strategy circles if Japan seeks to encircle China. It cannot achieve this goal even if it cooperates with the US.

Abe's visit to Southeast Asia will not bring China a sense of crisis. We can understand that Japan wants to strengthen its interests in Southeast Asia when the prospects of Sino-Japanese relations look bleak. We have no interest in competing for influence in Southeast Asia.

Japan in Asia is a good thing for China. There is no hope for Japan to defeat China strategically even there's a war between the two. However, Japan brings us stimulation and vigilance. It warns what kind of external resistance China may face in its future rise.

China should both take Japan seriously and be indifferent at the strategic level. Despite the prominence of the dispute, Japan is only a small part of the strategic hidden dangers for China.

If Abe's trip to Southeast Asia is aimed at "containing China," he can only reduce Japan's role on the political stage of Asia. The trip will only be a show without substantive content. Maybe Abe's cabinet is not so stupid. They want to expand Japan's economic space "after the Sino-Japanese friendship."

As to anti-Japanese feeling in Chinese public opinion, we should prevent it from being a trap for ourselves. We cannot be overly angry with Japan, concentrate all attention to Japan and forget others.

It should be Japan that worries most about Sino-Japanese relations, instead of China. China is rising and we are the driving force of changes in Asian geopolitics. Just let Japan mess about in China's surrounding areas. Japan's negotiations with claimants in South China Sea disputes will have no effect. It will be no better than a kind of self-comforting.

Frequent changes of Japanese cabinet have resulted in many political actions for show. Toward Japan, China should not only be cautious, but not to overreact.- Global Times

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American man looking for wife gets marriage offers instead

PETALING JAYA: After his wife went missing from the airport, American Henry Chuen went to the media hoping to find her. He did not. Instead, he is finding many women interested in taking his wife's place.

The 63-year-old man said many women had e-mailed him with “proposals”, telling him to forget about his wife, and be with them instead.

“More than five women have called me and told me to forget about my wife Lisa.

“They wanted me to take them away to the US and some even promised me that they would make me happy,” he told The Star yesterday.

But Chuen is not about to be tempted. He is more determined than ever to find his wife.

“I am touched that many women had reached out to me but my main goal is to find my wife.

“We made a vow of marriage...to me, that is one of the most sacred things in the world,” he said.

Chuen had previously sought the public's help to locate his wife Lisa Cheong Lai Har, 45, who had gone missing from KLIA just as they were to return to the United States in November last year.

Chuen met Cheong, an administrative assistant in a private college, through an online matchmaking website in early 2008.

They finally met in Kuala Lumpur after six months of online correspondence. On May 31, 2009, they married in Las Vegas and settled in San Francisco.

The couple last returned to Malaysia in September to visit Cheong's dying father in Ipoh.

Chuen is offering a reward for any information on Lisa. He can be contacted at 017-395 9491.

By SHAUN HO
shaun@thestar.com.my

West is failing to capitalise on rising China

We are rapidly moving away from an 'old world' dominated by Europe, the United States and Japan to a 'new world' led by China

 

SINGAPORE: Western nations have failed to capitalise on China's economic rise as they struggle with their own problems, leaving others to benefit from the Asian giant's insatiable demand, HSBC said.
 
"The world economy is increasingly led by China. Those nations raising their China exposure have outperformed. Western nations, faced with internal discord, have failed to grab the opportunity," the bank said.

"We are rapidly moving away from an 'old world' dominated by Europe, the US and Japan to a 'new world' led by China," it said in a report entitled "The Great Rotation".

Among the beneficiaries of the global shift are countries located close to China and far-flung exporters that supply the Asian giant's demand for commodities, the report noted.

South Korea's exports to China currently account for 12 percent of its gross domestic product (GDP), up from 3.5 percent in 2000, HSBC said.

Malaysia and Singapore are also key industrial exporters to China while commodities producers like Australia, Chile, Kazakhstan and Saudi Arabia "have also shared in the spoils," the bank added.

"And in demonstrating China's ever-increasing connections with Africa, Angola is now China's 14th most important source of imports ahead of India, France, Canada, Italy and Britain," it said.

Western countries, in contrast, have failed to exploit Chinese demand, it said.

US exports to China account for a mere 0.7 percent of US GDP, with Canada, France and Italy "more or less" at the same level, HSBC said.

Britain's exports to China are even less significant at 0.4 percent of British GDP, it said.

While Germany has expanded its trade ties with China, this was overshadowed by a bigger increase in its dependence on the rest of Europe, HSBC noted.

This is "one reason why, despite its competitive advantages, Germany found itself succumbing in the second half of 2012 to a crisis which had already engulfed other parts of the eurozone," the bank said.

HSBC forecasts China's economy to grow 8.6 percent this year, up from an estimated 7.8 percent expansion in 2012.

The US and Japanese economies are expected to grow 1.7 percent and 0.2 percent respectively next year while the eurozone is likely to contract 0.2 percent, the bank said.- AFP