More Japanese Cities in Friendship Ties with Taiwan

While Ma Ying-jeou and Xi Jinping meet on November 7 to suggest China and Taiwan are in some sort of agreement on the national level, more Taiwanese municipalities are anxious to come in friendship partnerships with Japanese counterparts since Prime Minister Shinzo Abe returned to power for the second time, reports the Sankei Shimbun, November 6.

It's amazing how China has ceased to meddle in Taiwan's friendly offensives to Japan. Prior to Sendai's partnership agreement signed in 2006, the capital city of Miyagi Prefecture had had a "warning" from the Chinese Embassy in Tokyo via Minister Cheng Yonghua to Mayor Katsuhiko Umehara to "be cautious about signing" such a partnership agreement. Mayor Seiji Hagiwara of Okayama City had received a similar objection from the Chinese Embassy in Tokyo prior to their partnership agreement with Hsin-Chu City in Taiwan.

No sooner had Prime Minister Abe and his Liberal Democratic Party won the 2012 general elections to take the helm of state than Gunma Prefecture concluded an agreement of friendship and cooperation with Changhua County of Taiwan, followed by 12 more in Gunma, 2 in Kaga City, Ishikawa, and 2 each in Shizuoka and Kumamoto. As of this writing, a total of 25 partnership ties has been signed between municipalities of Japan and Taiwan.

According to Friends of Lee Teng-Hui Association in Japan, the first Japan-Taiwan friendship agreement was inked in 1979 between Omamachi, Aomori and Huwei, Yunlin. Partnership agreements were signed at an average pace of less than one a year before the  general elections and eight every year thereafter.

Last July Lee Teng-Hui visited Japan for the seventh time and spoke at the Diet attended by 300 parliament members to uplift Japan's intimacy toward Taiwan. Foreign ministry spokesmen are in agreement in that Japan-Taiwan ties on the municipal level will be further promoted.