Different attitudes

The results of an opinion poll sponsored by China Daily and the Japanese nonprofit think tank Genron NPO, which were released in Tokyo on Wednesday, serve as a barometer for people to gauge the dynamics of China-Japan relations.

Given that this year marks the 40th anniversary of the normalization of China-Japan ties, the findings of the polls, which were conducted simultaneously this year in China and Japan, could serve as a useful reference for decision-makers to recalibrate their interaction and cooperation.

The findings of the survey indicate the number of Chinese who have positive attitudes toward Japan has increased after a dip in 2011. About 31.8 percent of those polled in China say they now have good feelings toward Japan.

To some extent, this favorable change in Chinese people's attitudes toward Japan is inseparably linked with the continuous efforts the Chinese government and society have made to nourish its good neighborly ties with Japan.

But it is noteworthy that of all the issues that are preventing bilateral ties from growing more healthily, it is the Diaoyu Islands that are cited as the top concern by Chinese respondents to the survey.

This is not at all difficult to fathom as tensions over the long-standing issue have escalated this year after Japanese rightists staged one farce after another following Tokyo governor Shintaro Ishihara's proposal to "purchase" the Diaoyu Islands in defiance of the historical facts that China has indisputable sovereignty over the islands.

In contrast to the growing positive attitude toward Japan among Chinese people, the survey suggests that the number of Japanese people who harbor a negative attitude toward its neighbor has continued to rise. In 2011, 78.3 percent of Japanese respondents said they had "negative" or "relatively negative" impressions of China. This year, the figure increased to 84.3 percent.

Such a result is worrying as it does not reflect the interdependency of our two economies, the high frequency of people-to-people exchanges and the colossal size of bilateral trade. Nor does it reflect the unselfish assistance China offered its neighbor after Japan was hit by the devastating earthquake and the ensuing tsunami in March 2011.

Japan should do more to cultivate a more favorable atmosphere for its interaction with China. This will be a move conforming to the importance of China-Japan ties, which the majority of those polled in both countries recognized.

(China Daily 06/21/2012 page8)