International community must resolutely thwart any attempt to revive militarism: Chinese spokesperson

The international community must stay highly vigilant and resolutely thwart any attempt to revive militarism, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said on Wednesday in response to a related query about the recent provocative remarks by Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi regarding Taiwan.

Analysts have pointed out that among all the prime ministers of Japan, Takaichi was the first to clearly state a "Taiwan contingency" could constitute a "survival-threatening situation" for Japan. In such an event, Japan may invoke the so-called right to collective self-defense to interfere militarily in the Taiwan Strait.

Mao said the right of collective self-defense set forth in the UN Charter is created to safeguard the collective security of the international community and prevent the revival of fascist forces. Japan has been restricted from exercising this right since the end of World War II.

She said that a review of history shows that launching aggression against other countries under the pretext of a "survival-threatening situation" and "self-defense" has always been a convenient tactic of Japanese militarism.

She went on to point out that in 1931, Japan called whether it could seize "Manchuria" as "survival-threatening" and used that as a pretext to carry out the September 18th Incident and invade and occupy Northeast China. Japan later claimed that to defend "the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere" was an existential battle for Japan, enlarging its war of aggression to the entirety of Asia. Whether to attack Pearl Harbor was also deemed as "survival-threatening" to Japan, which ignited the Pacific War.

On the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the victory of the Chinese People's War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression and the World Anti-Fascist War, the international community must be highly vigilant and resolutely thwart any attempt to revive militarism and jointly safeguard the post-war international order and world peace, Mao added.