A love-hate relationship

It's amazing how paradoxical the relationship between China and Japan can be. Today the Japan Times had two articles that illustrate the point vividly. One discusses the 19.8% increase in Japanese investment (for a total of a whopping 6.5 billion yen!) in the mainland this past year, highlighting large pools of capital from automakers and electronics giants. Deregulation in China has made it easier for foreign firms to invest in the country directly, and they are now allowed to have full, 100% control over companies in China. (It used to be that you couldn't invest without having a Chinese partner and a joint-venture that shared the power and profits 50-50.) In short: economic ties between the two countries appear to be growing stronger than ever.

Unfortunately, the other article paints a starkly different picture. President Hu Jintao refused Japan's request to have top-level talks, essentially rejecting an invitation from Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi to chat. (They haven't met since October of 2001.) The reason? Koizumi's visits to the highly controversial Yasukuni shrine, where several war criminals from WWII are deified. The response from the Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso was to tell reporters he believed the economic rivalry between the two countries would intensify in the future.

And these two views coming from the same newspaper, on the same webpage! I suppose drama sells, and this is one of the the most complicated love-hate relationships on the world stage today.