China to protest arrests of activists by Japan

China will lodge a complaint with Japan after it detained five Chinese activists who landed on disputed islands on Wednesday, Xinhua news agency said, as tension between Japan and its neighbors escalated on the anniversary of the end of World War II.

The landing by the activists on the islands in the East China Sea and their detention by Japan’s coastguard came on a day of regional diplomatic jousting, underscoring how history haunts Japan’s ties with China and South Korea. Earlier, South Korea prompted an official protest from Japan after comments by South Korean President Lee Myung-bak which some saw as going too far by insulting Japanese Emperor Akihito. And in a move likely to anger Japan’s neighbors, two Japanese cabinet ministers paid homage at a controversial Tokyo shrine for the war dead.

Memories of Japan’s wartime occupation of much of China and colonisation of South Korea run deep despite close economic ties in one of the world’s wealthiest regions. Japan arrested the five members of a group of activists from China, Hong Kong and Macau who landed on the island chain, Japan’s coastguard said. Japan protested to China’s ambassador over the landing and Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda said Tokyo would deal with the matter strictly. China said it was protesting to Japan over the detentions, China’s state-run Xinhua news agency said.