Territory - Diaoyu Islands

State Responsibility - Countermeasure

Japan appeared to be determined to stay on its kamikaze course to provoke and confront China as a Japanese court approved its prosecutor's request to extend the detention of the captain of a Chinese fishing boat, which collided earlier with two Japan Coast Guard vessels near the disputed Diaoyu Islands. A Chinese vice FM expressed strong indignation and protest against the decision, and China announced that it had suspended all relations between provincial and central government officials and their Japanese counterparts, including talks aimed at expanding aviation routes and cooperation on coal.