TAIPEI (Reuters) -Taiwan President Lai Ching-te posted pictures on social media of himself eating Japanese-sourced sushi on Thursday to show his support for Japan in a bitter and worsening diplomatic dispute with China.
According to two government officials in Tokyo, Beijing has indicated it will halt Japanese seafood imports following a rise in since Japan’s new prime minister suggested Tokyo could intervene militarily if China attacked Taiwan.
“What are you eating? Now is perhaps a good time to eat Japanese food,” the president said in the post on his Facebook and Instagram accounts showing him sitting on a sofa holding up chopsticks and a plate of sushi.
“It fully shows the firm friendship between Taiwan and Japan,” he said of the sushi, which included ingredients from Taiwan such as cuttlefish as well as yellowtail from Kagoshima in Japan and scallops from the Japanese island of Hokkaido.
TAIWAN CRITICISES ‘BULLYING BEHAVIOUR’ BY CHINA
Taiwan’s government, which rejects sovereignty claims by China, has in recent years been subjected to similar food export bans by Beijing, including of Taiwanese pineapples and fish, in what Taipei has said is part of a Chinese pressure campaign.
Speaking to reporters at parliament earlier on Thursday, Taiwan Foreign Minister Lin Chia-lung said China’s use of economic coercion and military intimidation to “bully other nations are already too numerous to mention individually.
“At this critical juncture, we must also support Japan in effectively stabilising the situation and halting the Chinese communists’ bullying behaviour,” he said.
Addressing lawmakers later, Lin said Taiwanese should make more visits to Japan and buy more Japanese goods to show their friendship with the country.
In Beijing, Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said Taiwan was an inseparable part of China’s territory.
“No matter what show the Lai Ching-te authorities put on, it cannot change this ironclad fact,” she added.
Beijing views democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory and has not ruled out the use of force to take control of the island. Taiwan’s government rejects Beijing’s claims and says only the island’s people can decide their future.
Japan and Taiwan have a close though unofficial relationship and deep cultural and business ties. Japan ruled Taiwan, which lies just over 110 km (68 miles) from Japanese territory at its closest point, from 1895 until the end of World War Two in 1945.
(Reporting by Ben Blanchard; Additional reporting by Liz Lee in Beijing; Editing by Kate Mayberry and Timothy Heritage)
