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Introduction
The recurring dispute over the Senkaku/Diaoyu/Tiaoyutai rocks among Japan, (People's Republic of) China and (Republic of China on) Taiwan raises important issues of territorial sovereignty claims, access to maritime (fisheries and petroleum) resources, and strategic sensitivities for these countries. The timing, method and intensity of the claim, when it was periodically reasserted, were dictated not only by the positions of the three countries on the sovereignty question, but more importantly, by domestic factors not fully within the control of the governments. These factors include the rise of nationalism or irredentism on China, the competition for legitimacy on Taiwan between separatist and pro-unification forces involving the powerful fishing lobby, and the influence of right-wing nationalist groups in Japanese politics.
The original dispute from 1970 and 1972 arose as a result of contending national claims to oil deposits discovered under the seabed adjacent to the rocks.1 However, it was soon magnified by Taiwanese student demonstrators in North America protesting against the Taiwanese government for engaging in joint development talks with Japan and (South) Korea while the issue of sovereignty over the Tiaoyutai islands has not yet been settled.2 These "Protect Tiaoyutai" activities started the trend of popular protests by Taiwanese, Hongkongers and overseas Chinese over the controversy. The next incident occurred in 1978, when pro-Taiwan Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) members in the Japanese Diet tried to pressure the Chinese government into conceding sovereignty over the Senkakus, in exchange for agreeing to an "anti-hegemony" clause in the proposed Sino-Japanese Peace and Friendship Treaty aimed at the Soviet Union.3 The Chinese then dispatched armed "fishing junks" into the territorial waters of the Diaoyu islands to assert sovereignty,4 and a Japanese rightwing nationalist group-the Seirankai (Clear Storm Group)-retaliated by erecting a beacon on the largest of the rocks, before the affair died down once more.5 The 1990 incident was the result of the Japanese government recognizing the beacon in its official navigational charts and allowing another Japanese nationalist group-the Nihon Seinensha (Japan Youth Federation)-to repair the beacon.6 This action invited the attention of Taiwanese athletes and journalists, who attempted to ascend the rocks with an Olympic torch,7 but were driven away by the Japanese coast guard or Maritime Safety Agency (MSA).8 The noisiest and most eventful flare-up of the...