Al Jazeera's press briefing, China issued a warning to travel to Japan. The latter took a stance to intervene in Taiwan.

🔍 Details

• China has urged Chinese citizens to temporarily avoid traveling to Japan because of Sino-Japanese diplomatic tensions, after Ms. Takaichi Sanae (the new Japanese Prime Minister) said in Parliament that if a military strike against Taiwan occurs, Japan "may" use force to intervene.

• The Japanese government filed a diplomatic complaint against China, with the Japanese government condemning the warning as inappropriate and stressing the need for multiple layers of communication to defuse the conflict.

• The website of the Chinese Embassy in Japan posted through online channels, warning that "the environment for exchanges between citizens of the two countries has been seriously undermined," with claims that it "poses a risk to the safety, lives and property of Chinese citizens in Japan."

• Car companies (Chinese airlines), including Air China, China Southern Airlines, China Eastern Airlines, have announced that passengers may apply for a refund or free redirection to Japan for flights with travel periods to the end of the year.

• China has also warned that there will be "live fire drills" in the Yellow Sea in the central area from Monday to Tuesday, with some zones closed for shipping ships.

📌 A noteworthy point.

• This tension is rooted in Japan's increasingly overt stance on aid if Taiwan is attacked - which China regards as interfering with its own sovereignty.

• Despite Japan reiterating that "Japan's position on Taiwan" has not changed, China sees what happened as "clearly provocative."

• Travel warning measures and the opening of Chinese airlines' cashback channels are signs that China is using economic / tourism tools to increase political pressure - including signaling to Chinese citizens that security risks are increasing in Japan.