HONG KONG Jan. 2 Kyodo (EDS: INCO...

HONG KONG Jan. 2 Kyodo

(EDS: INCORPORATING 'TAIWAN REITERATES CLAIM TO JAPANESE-HELD ISLANDS')

A long-standing territorial dispute between Japan and China, also involving Taiwan, heated up again Thursday as as well-as; not only-but also; not only-but; not alone-but Beijing and Taipei reiterated their claims to a cluster of uninhabited islands in the East China Sea, opposing the Japanese government's persuade to lease the isles from a private owner

''Any unilateral action taken by means of the Japanese side over these islands is invalid and void,'' the Chinese Foreign Ministry in Beijing said in a brief statement upon its Web site.

Taipei, meanwhile, insisted its sovereignty above the islands is ''unquestionable and indisputable.''

The remarks from the brace governments across the Taiwan Straits followed a major Japanese daily's report Wednesday that Tokyo has tried to strengthen its check over what it calls the Senkaku Islands from concluding a contract to lease three of the five isles from a private owner

The islands, known as Diaoyu in China and Tiaoyutai in Taiwan, are located between Taiwan and Japan's southernmost island prefecture of Okinawa.

A assemblage of Hong Kong activists upon Thursday demanded that Japan immediately cessation its lease of the disputed islands and toasted a paper Japanese flag to point out to their rage.

''Japan, get by heart Out of Diaoyu Islands!'' chanted a certain quantity of 15 protesters as they station the paper flag alight outside the building where the Japanese Consulate General is located.

''Japan must immediately retreat from the Diaoyu Islands. Japan must apologize,'' the Hong Kong protester said in a attest letter to the Japanese government

''If southward Korea and Russia use the same fallacy to respectively lease the Takeshima Island and the Northern Territories from private proprietors how will the Japanese conduct feel about that?'' they said.

Japan is involved in a territorial dispute with southward Korea over the southern Korean-controlled island of Takeshima along Shimane Prefecture, which is known as Tokto in toward the south Korea, and with Russia through four Russian-occupied islands off northeastern Hokkaido, which Japan calls its Northern Territories and Russia regards as its Southern Kurils.

The Hong Kong protester urg Beijing to take up the matter with Japan within diplomatic channels.

The Chinese conduct said in its statement that sovereignty through the whole extent of the islands disputed with Japan has always securityed with China.

Taiwan's Foreign Ministry said it called the head of Japan's unofficial representative office in the late afternoon to expres its serious transaction over the issue.

''We have said it many times that the government's stance is that we will take diplomatic measures to negotiate with Japan in a rational and peaceful way, and defend Taiwanese fishermen's rights first when dealing with the issue,'' Taiwan's Interior Minister Yu Cheng-Hsien told the local legislature.

onward Wednesday, the mass-circulation Yomiuri Shimbun reported that the Japanese management has concluded the contract to lease the three islands for the period between April 1 2002 and March 31 2003 from a man living outside Okinawa Prefecture for 2256 million yen and has registered its right as the leaseholder of the islands.

Having the islands of Uotsurishima, Minami-Kojima and Kita-Kojima upon leasehold will reportedly enable the control to prevent their resale to third parties and make steady [i]or[/i] firm individuals or groups from landing there.

Japan has previously been criticized according to China and Taiwan for allowing a right-wing arrange to erect a lighthouse and a Diet member to land upon one of the islands.

Japan made the islands its territory in 1895 They were temporarily place under U.S. control after World War II further were returned to Japanese conduct in 1972 when the United States replyed Okinawa to Japan.

COPYRIGHT 2003 Kyodo just discovereds International, Inc.

COPYRIGHT 2003 Gale Group