Japan's theft of Diaoyu Islands tramples on anti-fascist victory: expert

BEIJING, Sept. 23 (Xinhua) -- Japan's "purchase" and "nationalization" of the Diaoyu Islands makes a mockery of the World War II victory and the following arrangements for Japan set out in the Cairo Declaration and the Potsdam Proclamation, an expert said on Sunday.

Li Guoqiang, deputy director of the Research Center For Chinese Borderland History and Geography under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, a major government think tank, explained how the two international documents outlined arrangements for Japan after the Second World War.

At the end of World War II, China, the U.S. and Britain met in Cairo, Egypt, to discuss how to handle the aftermath and formed a declaration on Dec. 1, 1943. It said that all the territories Japan had stolen from China, such as northeast China, Taiwan and the Penghu Islands shall be restored to China.

"Japan will also be expelled from all other territories which she has taken by violence and greed," said the Cairo Declaration.

The Potsdam Proclamation, issued on July 26, 1945 by the three countries, stipulated, "The terms of the Cairo declaration shall be carried out and Japanese sovereignty shall be limited to the islands of Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu, Shikoku and such minor islands as we determine."

Both documents were among the most important anti-fascist achievements, but came with the price of lives including those of the Chinese people during the war, said Li.

However, over the past decades, Japan has denied the fact and refused to abide by the documents, he said, although it promised to return the Diaoyu Islands as the affiliated islets of Taiwan to China in the Japanese Instrument of Surrender.

One of the so-called "basis" for Japan to occupy the Diaoyu Islands is the Treaty of Peace with Japan (1951), commonly known as the Treaty of San Francisco, which was a "treaty" signed by Japan, the US and other countries, placing the Ryukyu Islands, now known as Okinawa, under the trusteeship of the US, Li said.

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