Tokyo, 5 September, /AJMEDIA/
China and Japan did not use their defense hotline to communicate following an unprecedented violation of Japanese airspace by a Chinese military spy plane last week, diplomatic sources said Wednesday, casting fresh doubt over the direct line’s effectiveness in crisis management.
In May last year, the two Asian neighbors began operating a hotline between their senior defense officials, but it was not used in July following an incident where a Japanese Maritime Self-Defense Force destroyer temporarily sailed into Chinese territorial waters.
So far, the communication line has only been used during exchange events between the defense officials.
The continued nonuse of the direct line is feared to offer no help in avoiding accidental clashes between the two countries.
Bilateral communications were instead conducted via normal channels involving foreign and defense officials after the Chinese military aircraft violated Japanese airspace on Aug 26 over waters in the East China Sea off islands in the southwestern prefecture of Nagasaki, the sources said.
Beijing is believed to have told Tokyo that it did not intend to intrude into Japanese airspace.
According to internal operational guidelines of the hotline, the two countries’ defense authorities are required to hold discussions before using the communication line.
A Japanese government official said if the hotline had been used this time, prior discussions “would have lasted for several hours,” adding the time-consuming communication line is “useless” at present.
Some officials in both the Chinese and Japanese governments have called for modifying the guidelines to ensure swift and smooth communications between the two countries’ defense authorities.
The Japanese Defense Ministry said a Chinese military Y-9 spy plane flew over waters off the Danjo Islands in Nagasaki Prefecture for about two minutes from 11:29 a.m. on Aug 26. The Air Self-Defense Force scrambled fighter jets immediately after the intrusion.
The following day, Japanese Defense Minister Minoru Kihara declined to confirm whether the hotline had been used over the case.
China and Japan initially agreed to open a direct hotline in 2007, establishing the communication line in March last year. It is part of the Maritime and Aerial Communication Mechanism, launched by the two countries in 2018, to build mutual trust and prevent contingencies at sea and in the air.
The Chinese and Japanese defense ministers reaffirmed its importance during a meeting in Singapore in June.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning stressed the hotline’s significance at a press conference in Beijing on Wednesday, saying the direct line has “enriched” bilateral communication channels and “strengthened the management and control capabilities” of both sides in sea and air crises.
