Chinese envoy: Japan 'totally unqualified' to seek permanent seat on UN Security Council

Japan is "totally unqualified" to seek a seat as a permanent member of the UN Security Council, Fu Cong, China's permanent representative to the United Nations, said on Tuesday.

Speaking at the UN General Assembly's annual debate on Security Council reform, Fu noted that recently Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi made a "brazen, provocative" statement on Taiwan at the Diet, claiming that a "Taiwan contingency" could be a "survival-threatening situation" for Japan. She implied that Japan may invoke the so-called right to collective self-defense to interfere militarily in the Taiwan Strait.

"Sanae Takaichi's remarks on Taiwan are extremely erroneous and dangerous. They constitute a gross interference in China's internal affairs and a serious breach of the one-China principle and the spirit of the four political documents between China and Japan," Fu said.

They are an affront to international justice, damage the post-war international order, trample on the basic norms of international relations, and represent a blatant departure from Japan's commitment to peaceful development, the Chinese envoy added.

"Such a country is totally unqualified to seek a permanent seat on the Security Council," the ambassador said.