Japan and Taiwan concluded a fisheries agreement on Wednesday to establish a joint fisheries management zone in waters around the Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea, Japan’s Jiji Press reported.
Under the pact, the joint fishing area will be set up within Japan’s exclusive economic zone to allow Taiwanese fishing boats to operate without Japanese permission.
The agreement, the outcome of difficult negotiations kicked off 17 years ago, was made at a final meeting of Japanese and Taiwanese representatives in Taipei on Wednesday afternoon.
The pact is seen as a way for Japan to strengthen friendly relations with Taiwan at a time when Beijing is calling on Taipei to join hands in fighting for sovereignty over the islands, called Diaoyu in China, that belong to Japan’s Okinawa Prefecture. The small island chain is also claimed by Taiwan.
In Beijing the same day, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei expressed “grave concern” over the Japan-Taiwan agreement.
Meanwhile, Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga told a press conference in Tokyo that the fisheries agreement was intended to conserve marine resources, maintain orderly operations of fishing boats, and keep stability in the East China Sea.
According to informed sources, Japan made a substantial concession to Taiwan in the course of the negotiations by setting aside the territorial row and agreeing to establish the free fishing zone for both Japanese and Taiwanese fishermen within the Japanese EEZ. Japan, however, will not allow Taiwanese fishing boats to enter Japanese waters up to 12 nautical miles from the islands.
The Japan-Taiwan fisheries talks were launched in 1996, through the Interchange Association, Japan’s window for exchanges with Taiwan, and its Taiwanese counterpart, the East Asia Relations Commission. The two organisations are acting on behalf of the governments of Japan and Taiwan because the two Asian economies have no diplomatic ties.
In their 16th meeting, held in February 2009, the two sides agreed to set up a means of emergency contact for boat collisions. After that meeting, however, the talks were suspended until November 2012, due to their wrangling over the ownership of the islands.
The restart of the discussions followed growing signs of China and Taiwan cooperating on control of the islands, after the Japanese government purchased three of the five Senkaku islands to effectively nationalise the island group in September 2012.
As Japan and Taiwan had no fishery pact for the waters around the islands, fisheries activities by Taiwanese boats in Japan’s EEZ had been under the jurisdiction of Japan.
Since the de facto nationalisation, Taiwanese boats have frequently entered Japanese waters near the islands. When some 50 Taiwanese fishing vessels entered Japanese territorial waters near the island on Sept 25 last year, Japan Coast Guard ships used water cannon against them.
At a press conference earlier on Wednesday in Beijing, Fan Liqing, a spokesman at the Taiwan Affairs Office of China’s State Council, underscored that the islands are an integral part of China.
The spokesman said that China and Taiwan are both responsible for maintaining the interests of fishermen in waters near the islands, which are traditional fishing grounds, based on the premise that the two hold sovereignty over the islands.
2013 BERNAMA