News China resumes visas for Japanese

Investment by Japanese companies is essential for China's economic recovery," a source close to the Chinese government said. "The resumption of issuance after the Lunar New Year, when business activity in China resumes in earnest, came into view." […] A Japanese trading house executive stationed in China said: "In China, business takes off after the Lunar New Year, and we are relieved that the reopening is timed to coincide with this. The Chinese government's desire to encourage cooperation between Japanese and Chinese companies is apparent."

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There was a similar aspect to China's retaliation against Japan's border controls. As the leader of a democratic country, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida had a responsibility to explain to the public why Japan was requiring stricter testing for travelers from China. On two occasions, Kishida publicly referred to the measures, before they were implemented on Jan. 8. But Beijing took these acts as hostile: By unnecessarily explaining the situation to the Japanese public, Kishida insulted Xi, who had just entered his third term, the thinking went. China's visa retaliation was likely hatched by China's new top-duo diplomats, Wang Yi and Qin Gang, out of maximum consideration to Xi. [...] A diplomatic source said that the two cannot afford to be seen as too soft on Japan from the get-go. "They had no choice but to take some countermeasure." If the visa ban had persisted over the long haul, economic relations between the countries, the world's second- and third-largest economies, would undoubtedly have collapsed.

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