BEIJING - China has witnessed many anti-Japanese demonstrations in April this year. In particular, April 9 saw an anti-Japanese demonstration and march with over 10,000 participants. Demonstrators broke the glass of Japanese restaurants along the route to the Japanese Embassy, burnt Japanese flags and damaged Japanese cars. There were over a thousand police monitoring and controlling the parade the entire time. Residents in Beijing say that this was the biggest demonstration since the June 4th Massacre of 1989.

However, an eyewitness at the scene in Zhong’guan Village told an The Epoch Times reporter that many demonstrators were simply “hanging out” and that the demonstration seemed “half-hearted,” with only a few people in the front row shouting slogans.

A Voice of America (VOA) reporter, Celia Hatton, stated, “Political protests are rare in China. Even so, unarmed police watched Saturday's crowds passively. Some students said their universities and schools had encouraged them to attend.”

Some Chinese citizens were doubting the “validity” of the parade and thought it was staged by the CCP. Information on the Internet indicated that an anti-Japanese demonstration taking place in Shenzhen earlier was composed of mostly plain-clothes police.

Japan Asahi News reported that recent anti-Japanese demonstrations in China had reached a peak on April 9 in Beijing, where about 7,600 Japanese citizens reside. Chinese police tolerated the destructive activities of the demonstrators, stopping the chaos only from further expansion. The severity of the demonstration exceeded the government’s expectations- it showed the lack of Chinese government control over the size of the anti-Japanese parade.

Japan Sankei News concluded that Xinhua News has never reported demonstrations by citizens before and that its report on the anti-Japanese parade indicated that the Chinese government and the CCP allowed not only the reporting of the parade, but also the parade itself.

The originally planned visit to China on April 17 by Japanese Foreign Minister Machimura Nobutaka has been postponed, with the Japanese government requesting the Chinese government to guarantee his absolute safety.

CCP is Diverting People’s Attention

According to a Central News Agency report on April 3, the political commentator Lin Baohua (Ling Feng) indicates that the CCP’s actions in using this time to motivate an anti-Japanese mood is in fact to serve its own needs. It revolves around the issue with Taiwan, with a perceived need to tie Japan and Taiwan together in order to stimulate a “shared common hatred” psychology, with the intention of gaining more support from the public regarding the Anti-Secession Law.

It also has something to do with such news media-driven activities as the "Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party"; and movements of "Say Goodbye to the Chinese Communist Party", and "Resign from the Chinese Communist Party" which are all causing Beijing big trouble. Therefore, in their view, diverting the public’s focus to the historical factors which initially caused an anti-Japanese mood may alleviate this difficult situation.

Free Asian Broadcasting Station commentator Chen Jingsong has published an article stating that in the recent “resistance to Japanese products” wave, the sentiment of those citizens who claim love for the motherland is genuine, but the government-inspired behavior of “singing the patriotism sound” is an illusion. There are indeed some independent members of the populace who harbor real anti-Japanese sentiment, but those who follow the government’s direction are not genuine citizens.

Continuous Anti-Japanese Demonstrations in Beijing Reach Highest Point

Recently, there have been other anti-Japanese demonstrations in many cities in China. On April 2, protests were held in Changsha in Hunan Province, Chengdu in Sichuan Province, Luoyang in Henan Province, Guilin in Guangxi Province, and Chongqing in Sichuan Province. Xiamen in Fujian Province and Liaoning Province experienced protests on April 3, with the Beijing one on April 9 being the latest.

Notification of the Beijing demonstration was posted on several domestic forums and websites ahead of time. The notices indicate that the demonstration was initiated by students from universities in Beijing. The students called upon “patriotic friends to join the protest and to spread the news to more than 20 people.” They specified the time and place as 9 a.m. on April 9 at Hailong Gate.

The demonstration, consisting of several thousand people, started out from Zhong’guan Village. Crowds along the route joined the march with the number of demonstrators swelling to 10,000. Beijing Public Safety sent out hundreds of police cars and thousands of officers to monitor the demonstrators. Hundreds of police surrounded the gathering crowd as some of the demonstrators started to shout out slogans and to hold up banners and boards. In the afternoon, the protestors split in two directions. Half of them went to the Japanese Embassy and the remainder entered Japanese residential areas. The police traveled in front to clear traffic for them. Over 30 police cars followed the crowd going to the Japanese Embassy and several rows of police surrounded the crowd. There were hundreds of fully-equipped police around the Japanese Embassy. At noon the Chinese government informed the Japanese Embassy, “There will be a march heading toward the embassy.” At 4 p.m. the demonstrators reached the Japanese Embassy and began throwing rocks into the building, burning Japanese flags, and damaging Japanese cars. Chinese police did not stop these actions, although anything more violent was halted.

According to Japanese statistics, more than 20 windows were broken in the embassy and at several Japanese restaurants. Cars and billboards along the demonstration route were damaged or destroyed. That night there were still people sitting outside of the embassy, preventing the Japanese officials from leaving the building. So far, there have been no casualties reported.

Ambassador Anami of the Japanese Embassy in Beijing raised his concern to the Chinese government. He said he “strongly requests (the Chinese government) to prevent similar events and ensure Japanese nationals’ safety.”

Japanese media reported the anti-Japanese parade in Zhongguancun, emphasizing that Xinhua News did not report through Chinese media inside China any of the anti-Japanese parades that have occurred recently. The only reports have been in English to overseas media about the anti-Japanese parade in Beijing.

Beijing Government’s Track Record Regarding Parade Permit Applications

It has been reported that the permit application for the Zhongguan Village anti-Japanese parade was submitted on April 9, the date of the parade, and was approved at the scene by the police.

Historically, permits for others kinds of demonstrations have been difficult to get and have frequently landed the applicant in jail.

The following incidents document these cases:

• In 2003, protestors Sun Shuping and Wu Daming were arrested for applying for permits when planning a parade of 10,000 demonstrators in Beijing;

• Several months after applying for a permit in order to organize an anti-corruption parade in Shanghai, Hu Yuwen was beaten and arrested by police in 2004;

• A former army officer from Xinjiang, A.R. Li Xiaocheng submitted a parade permit application to Beijing City Police Bureau before the Aug. 7, 2004 of plans for a parade that would comprise 10,000 people. He was arrested two days before the planned parade and sentenced to an undisclosed term;

• In 2004, Beijing resident, Ye Guozhu, was arrested for applying several times to the Beijing government for a parade permit for 10,000 people; he was sentenced during 2005 to four years in prison;

• Beijing resident Zhao Xin was arrested and detained for more than two months in 2005 because he applied for permission to hold a parade in memory of Chinese former Premier Zhao Ziyang.

• Ye Guozhu once complained to the Police Bureau that “you never actually approved any parade permit application submitted by citizens,” to which the police answered, “It is good that you understand this.”