Cairo Conference and the Dispute of Diaoyu Islands

Abstract

Cairo Conference, the conference held by modern China and world powers under the circumstance that China was poor and weak, has an epoch-making significance. It was the first meeting that China was treated as an equal sovereign country, which helped China benefit a lot. The Cairo Declaration has significant influence on the ownership of disputed Diaoyu Islands. On the 70th anniversary of the successful holding of the Cairo Conference, it has strong legal significance and realistic value to study the Cairo Conference and the dispute of Diaoyu Islands in the situation of the increasing tension among the disputed islands. The Cairo Declaration has great legal value to confirm the ownership of Diaoyu Islands. The international law validity of the Cairo Declaration has sufficiently proved this fact, but lacks specific argument about the fact that the Diaoyu Islands is included in the revertible territory of Republic of China requested in the Cairo Declaration. The basis of the fact that the Diaoyu Islands is included in the revertible territory of Republic of China can be found out in following aspects: Diaoyu Islands was stolen by Japan The Cairo Declaration explicitly stipulates that the purpose of three countries is to deprive all the islands captured or occupied in force from the Pacific Ocean by Japan since the beginning of the first world war in 1914; the territory stolen by Japan should be returned to the Republic of China, including the northeast four provinces, Formosa and the Penghu Islands; Japan shall be deported from any other land it seized in force or greed (The Cairo Declaration has no official Chinese version, and the above is the general translation). The stipulation used “stolen” to describe the territory occupied by Japan, which was particularly appropriate on Diaoyu Island Issue. In English version, the stipulation used “stolen” to emphasis that the Diaoyu Islands was seized in force by Japan. Some Japanese regards the Diaoyu Islands as terra nullius, but there are many solid evidences to prove that this is wrong. Diaoyu Islands was definitely stolen by Japan under the circumstance that China was poor and weak and had no strong ocean dominion sense. Since 1885, having explored the Diaoyu Islands secretly, the county magistrate of Okinawa used to submit written documents to central government for many times, asking for setting up “national identity” on the islands. However, the Japanese government tacitly approved that the Diaoyu Islands belonged to the Qing Government. The Japanese government had more concern and restrained its behavior especially after Qing government set up General Navy Affairs Yamen (a government office in feudal China) and Taiwan Province to enhance its coast defense. It was three months before the assignment of Treaty of Shimonoseki that the Japanese government, considering the failure of Qing government, held cabinet council to secretly include the Diaoyu Islands as a terra nullius into Okinawa. Japanese government, however, failed to declare its sovereignty to Diaoyu Islands, which had extreme inconformity to the action it did after occupying Daito islands to which the government declared its sovereignty immediately. The only reason to explain this is that Japanese government knew this was dishonorable and tried to cover it up on purpose. Moreover, the Japanese government did not make it public for a long time at home. Therefore, Japan definitely stole the Diaoyu Islands. Diaoyu Islands is the affiliated island of Formosa that was explicitly mentioned in the Cairo Declaration. Therefore, as Formosa is mentioned, Diaoyu Islands must have been included. There are abundant evidences to prove that Diaoyu Islands is the affiliated islands of Formosa. Affiliated Islands is not only a geographic concept, but also an administrative concept. Diaoyu 3rd International Conference on Science and Social Research (ICSSR 2014) © 2014. The authors Published by Atlantis Press 1467 Islands belongs to the continental island of Formosa on the geographical structure. Its geomorphic and geographic features indicate that Diaoyu Island locates on the continental shelf of the East China Sea as the natural extension of Formosa. Moreover, in terms of administrative concept, China is the first country to exercise the administrative jurisdiction of Diaoyu Islands. Hu Zongxian, the top general garrisoning the Southeast Coastal in Ming dynasty, and geographer Zheng Ruozeng compiled the Map Series about the Sea (1562) to compile the Diaoyu Islands and other islands into a coastal topographic map called the Map with Coastal Sea, Mountains and Islands and regarded it as the territory of China to garrison. This is one of the earliest written work to prove that China exerts effective jurisdiction over the Diaoyu Islands. However, why did not the Cairo Declaration mention the “affiliated island”? The second section in the Treaty of Shimonoseki regulated that Japan occupied Liaotung Peninsula, Formosa and its affiliated islands and Penghu Islands while the Cairo Declaration only enumerated the land that should be return to China. It is easily to find out that the listed lands in the Cairo Declaration included all the lands we lost from the Treaty of Shimonoseki through comparison. In order to confirm it strictly, the Cairo Declaration listed the key and conflicted territory so that Formosa and its affiliated islands which were lost from the Treaty of Shimonoseki were particularly referred to in the declaration to avoid leaving leftover problems. Chiang Kai-shek wrote in his dairy that what a significant event and hope it was to return the northeast four provinces, Formosa and the Penghu Islands we had lost for 50 years or 12 years respectively under the declaration both by Great Britain and America as well as to guarantee the freedom and independence of Korea, which was even announced in the declaration. This was a significant foreign affair success from ancient to modern times. From then on, however, if we failed to endeavor, all these success were only a mere scrap of paper. In this dairy, Chiang used a number 50 which indicated that the Formosa mentioned in the Cairo Declaration corresponded to the Formosa and its affiliated islands in the Treaty of Shimonoseki. In this situation, why did the declaration failed to list the Diaoyu Islands explicitly? Recently, the Diaoyu Islands issue attracts the world attention; 70 years ago when the Cairo Conference was held, however, the disputed islands was rarely noticed by the public. There were numerous islands stolen by Japan so it was impossible to list all those islands. Diaoyu Islands, the affiliated island of Formosa, was small and uninhabited, let alone the undiscovered fuel resources and the awareness about national sea power. Therefore, it was very common not to list it particularly, which had no influence on returning it to China. The indirect connection between the Cairo Conference and the dispute of Diaoyu Island. Cairo Conference, the conference held by modern China and world powers under the circumstance that China was poor and weak, has an epoch-making significance. It was the first meeting that China was treated as an equal sovereign country, which helped China benefit a lot. Some scholars named this conference as “the diplomacy summit of China during the world war. The main topic of the conference was to discuss the war cooperation towards Japan and the methods to deal with Japan after the war. There were no other regrets of this conference towards other disputed issues except for the Diaoyu Islands. The dispose of the Ryukyu Islands and the form of the dispute of Diaoyu Islands There is close connection between the Diaoyu Islands issue which is the core dispute among the relationship between China and Japan and the discussion and solution about the Ryukyu Islands. During the Cairo Conference, former American President Roosevelt used to suggest returning the Ryukyu Islands to China, but Chiang refused. The Chinese academics hold different views towards Chiang’s decision. Some of them are critical to Chiang’s behavior, considering that this decision left the door open for the future conflicts; others, however, regard this decision as a non-important variable. The suggestion by the America was just a kind of trial instead of its real thoughts and actions. The first opinion shows that there may be future trouble because of Chiang’s decision, but lacks