主题：很奇怪为什么那么多人不看好日本？ -- forger

In unusually vivid language, Mr Liu even compares modern Japan to Lord Voldemort, the villain of the Harry Potter stories who eventually “dies hard”. The ambassador appealed to Britain to side with China against Japan in the escalating row between Beijing and Tokyo,

In the Harry Potter story, the dark wizard Voldemort dies hard because the seven horcruxes, which contain parts of his soul, have been destroyed. If militarism is like the haunting Voldemort of Japan, the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo is a kind of horcrux, representing the darkest parts of that nation’s soul.

At stake is the credit of that country’s leaders in observing the purposes and principles of the UN Charter and upholding peace. It is a choice between aggression and non-aggression, between good and evil and between light and dark. Regrettably, what Mr Abe did has raised the spectre of militarism rising again in Japan.

Everyone knows that relations between Japan and China are strained, especially in the East China Sea. Japan has been exercising utmost restraint. When a Chinese destroyer directed its fire-control radar at a Japanese destroyer last year, which in normal naval practice might be regarded as an act of war, the Japanese vessel made an evasive manoeuvre rather than risk further endangering the situation. Chinese ships repeatedly intrude into Japanese territorial waters surrounding the Senkaku Islands, which have been peacefully under Japan’s sovereignty for 120 years.

Further evidence of Chinese provocation was seen with Beijing’s unilateral declaration of an Air Defence Identification Zone covering the islands and overlapping with Japan’s own ADIZ. Despite such steps, Japan continues to call for dialogue. Can Japan really be considered to be displaying dangerous militarism, as stated by China’s ambassador Liu Xiaoming in this newspaper on January 2?

Let me outline some facts. Japan’s record over the past 68 years shows the strength of its democracy, its respect for human rights (one is not arrested in Japan for criticising the government), its commitment to peace (e.g. a strong contribution to UN peace-keeping operations), and its willingness to help developing countries. Our maritime forces never harass neighbours on the high seas and we have upheld in action the values inscribed in the UN Charter. Such values are so deeply ingrained in Japan that a visit to a shrine cannot undo them.

Following the great sacrifices made during the Second World War by the United Kingdom, among others, our two countries are now close allies in the pursuit of peace, sharing the fundamental values of liberal democracy. This was evidenced, for example, in recent cooperation to support disaster relief operations in the Philippines.

It is ironic that a country that has increased its own military spending by more than 10 per cent a year for the past 20 years should call a neighbour “militarist”. China’s military budget is now the second largest in the world and more than twice that of Japan’s. Its attempt to change the status quo by force or coercion has raised concerns not only in Japan, but also among its neighbours throughout the East China Sea and the South China Sea.