Talk:Senkaku Islands dispute/Archive 6

ROC name usage
Rklawton was perfectly correct in using the format "Republic of China (Taiwan)" The reference page cited by Qwyrxian clearly says When identifying the state and attempting to differentiate it from the PRC (e.g. "Taipei is the capital of the Republic of China (Taiwan).") In general, this only needs to be done once, subsequent references to the ROC need not include "(Taiwan)". "Taiwan" is clearly the popular name for the entity, and the sentence in question seeks to distinguish the two Chinese entities. Wiki-lawyering aside, the reference page is a guideline to be applied with flexibility and common sense. Eclecticology (talk) 07:52, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I agree with Eclecticology. I wondered why Magog the Ogre and Qwyrxian reverted the edit. The problem is the abbreviation "PRC" and "ROC" used for subsequent mentions are not defined anywhere. One solution is to define at the first mention of these nations in the lead like "... the People's Republic of China (PRC) and the Republic of China (Taiwan) (ROC).", however the consecutive parentheses may not be smart. If you have any idea, please let me know. ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 09:19, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
 * I also agree that it is good to refer to Taiwan at least once. It's not immediately clear what the difference between the PRC and ROC is. Using (Taiwan) once at the start helps clear this up. John Smith&#39;s (talk) 10:55, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Huh...I don't know what I was thinking. I don't know if I misread WP:NC-CHINA, or the article. You're both correct that we are supposed to use the term Taiwan once.  Sorry about that. Qwyrxian (talk) 03:21, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Revert warring
Qwyxrian, before reverting sourced content, please discuss it first. The dispute between Japan and China over these islands is part of their dispute over territory in the East China Sea. Cla68 (talk) 11:30, 2 March 2012 (UTC)

Historical development rewrite?
I would like to propose that the entire "historical developments" section be fundamentally rewritten. Listing every event that has occurred seems to violate WP:NOTNEWS. Further, it's giving undue prominence to various events; for example, I don't think that anyone in any country would doubt that the 2010 collision incident had, by far, more overall effect on the dispute and international relations than, say the later complaint that year from the LDP to Google maps. Finally, chronologies simply aren't good encyclopedia writing--we should have prose, not just bulleted lists. Thus, I would like to completely rewrite this section, converting it to prose, and pruning out the less important events. However, I'd like to get at least broad approval before I undertake such a task; then, if people think there's value in such a change, I'd make a draft in my userspace before actually editing the article directly. Qwyrxian (talk) 23:48, 22 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I agree with you. Currently the section has too many pieces of trivial information. Oda Mari (talk) 05:37, 23 January 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm very late to the discussion, but I agree as well. Khazar2 (talk) 01:45, 19 August 2012 (UTC)

Linkfarm tag
I add the linkfarm tag to the External Links section. The purpose of EL sections is not to provide a link to every somewhat related position. In addition, it shouldn't be used as a space to fight a proxy battle about the ownership of the islands. We need to cut that section down by about half. Anyone have any suggestions how we could go about doing that? Qwyrxian (talk) 23:14, 24 July 2012 (UTC)
 * I'd propose cutting out all academic articles, editorials, and miscellaneous news coverage, for starters. My understanding of WP:EL is that if those articles have valuable information, it should be mostly integrated into our article anyway. I'd suggest including the most detailed official statement from each government we can find, perhaps the satellite image of the islands also, and leaving it at that. Khazar2 (talk) 01:54, 19 August 2012 (UTC)

Yuan's additions
I've asked Yuan52335233 to self-revert xyr addition, because it violated several different core WP policies (WP:NPOV and WP:OR, mainly) and duplicated material already in the article. I'm hoping xe does; but, if it stands for a day or so, I'll remove it again. However, I'm willing to discuss the matter here, and see if some part of that (if properly sourced and made neutral) might be appropriate to add. Qwyrxian (talk) 13:15, 18 August 2012 (UTC)
 * I apologize that I removed this section as unsourced before I saw your notice here. I agree with your critique, but unfortunately, Yuan has already reverted me. Khazar2 (talk) 02:02, 19 August 2012 (UTC)

The boundary? Within the boundary?
Some of the English in this article is a bit mangled, but some bits I can't tweek without knowing what the original says. "The Senkaku Islands ... became the Sino-Japanese boundary for the first time." Should this be "became within the Sino-Japanese boundary"? "became the boundary" states that the islands themselves were the boundary, the boundary ran through the land mass of the islands themselves. The usual use of this form is eg "the Bering Strait became the boundary"

82.38.206.148 (talk) 05:51, 19 August 2012 (UTC)

Citation fmt
I'm going to make an attempt to standardize the dates and citations in the article as part of a general cleanup. Hopefully this won't be controversial, but I wanted to post an advance warning here in case. Though our citation fmts on this article are currently split, both Xinhua and Japan Today appear to use Month Day, Year fmts on their front pages. Any objections to my standardizing to the same throughout our article? Khazar2 (talk) 14:57, 19 August 2012 (UTC)
 * This article is written in British English so the date formats should followed that used in Br Eng, ie day-moth-year. It doens't matter what the various sources use; this article is in Br Eng and so the dates should respect that.86.134.117.49 (talk) 17:04, 19 August 2012 (UTC)
 * I've got no problem with that--my only concern is to get a consistent format--but out of curiosity, where did you pick up that it was Br vs. Am Eng, and is that consistent in the article? Khazar2 (talk) 17:54, 19 August 2012 (UTC)

Citations tag?
I'm not clear why this has been marked with Template:Refimprove; it appears that every sentence in the article is footnoted. Perhaps tags to individual problem sentences, or a talk page note, would be more helpful in this case than a blanket template? Khazar2 (talk) 18:28, 19 August 2012 (UTC)
 * "Territorial dispute -- Beginings" para 1,3,5 + "Arguments from PRC and ROC" point 5 + "Japanese position" loose refs below table (30,31)
 * Also the events by year is just a list, it should be written encyclopaedically for flow.
 * And 1 sentence paragrphs need to be merged.Lihaas (talk) 23:10, 19 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks. Will try to tackle the four you point out. For now, I'll note individual citation needed tags on these points, and remove the blanket tag, which won't really help editors note the four missing references. If this seems improper to you, however, feel free to revert. Khazar2 (talk) 23:16, 19 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Thats fineLihaas (talk) 00:19, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

One-China policy
The lede mentions that the islands are disputed by both PROC and ROC as well as Japan. I believe this can cause confusion to persons unaware of the international One-China policy because it makes it sounds like a three-way enterprise, moreover that PROC and ROC are two mutually separate entities. Because of the fact that both claim to be China's legal authority with their controlled areas merely a truce, there is no internal dispute as to what constitutes China's outline; it may be longer winded but it would certainly be more acurate to explain that the islands are disputed by Japan and China (the latter per se), with maybe a footnote explaining that China is split in the way that it is. Any agreements? Evlekis (Евлекис) (argue) 22:22, 19 August 2012 (UTC)
 * But the One-China policy is not agreed to by everyone. As far as I understand it, ROC considers their claim on the islands to be separate. For example, they lodged a separate complaint with the Japanese government after the arrest of the Chinese activists who landed on Senkaku last week. However, I will freely admit to not being an expert in either Chinese politics or in the way Wikipedia represents them in articles, so feel free to show me why I'm wrong. Qwyrxian (talk) 22:29, 19 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes, ROC/Taiwan has publicly rebuffed every invitation from the PRC to join them in their efforts with Japan over the islands issue. Cla68 (talk) 22:38, 19 August 2012 (UTC)
 * See the following sources.
 * Taiwan will not cooperate with China on Diaoyu islands: spokesman
 * Ma Ying-jeou placed in dilemma by Diaoyutai activists
 * "There is a three-way claim involving China, Taiwan and Japan over the Senkaku Islands (known in Chinese as either Tiaoyu Tao or Tiao-yu-tai) and hence a conflict of claims over the adjacent shelf (see Map 3.3)."
 * "Japan, China and Taiwan are involved in a three-way territorial dispute over the Senkaku group, which is said to be rich in under-sea oil resources."
 * "Such jingoistic spats as those between Japan and South Korea over Toktu island in the mid-1990s and the ongoing three-way quarrel involving Japan, Taiwan, and China over the Senkaku (Diaoyu) islands are only the most visible incidents."
 * "Presumably, these are for Taiwan, the on-going three-way dispute over the Senkaku Group and Spratly Archipelago."
 * ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 23:01, 19 August 2012 (UTC)
 * comment i slighly reworded to clarify the lead before reading this. Feel free to change that if need beLihaas (talk) 23:14, 19 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Liihas thank you. What you've done brings the situation clopser to clarity. Concerning the other statements, I was only looking at the issue from a logisitical angle, naturally one does not expect ROC and PROC to stand side by side over any issue! These entities do not technically even admit the existence of the other - so you could hardly expect Beijing to hold stret parties if an international settlement rewards these islands to Taipei! I suppose in theory you can have one of these would-be Chinas claiming a territory that the other doesn't but it is almost senseless. Evlekis (Евлекис) (argue) 04:26, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Regardless of the status of One China, the claims by PRC and ROC are separate because the territory considered "China" by PRC and ROC is different. The ROC claims of what is "China" encompasses more territory than the PRC claims, since the PRC has settled some border disputes that the ROC has not recognized. -- 76.65.128.252 (talk) 06:48, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
 * That's interesting, thanks for the information. Come to that, I'm curious about Tibet. Without checking, I think China's final status annexation of the region was in 1950 and this comes after the ROC/PROC truce that remains in place. Evlekis (Евлекис) (argue) 12:00, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Actually, both PRC and ROC claims on Tibet originate from the Qing dynasty's conquest of Tibet, and that same conquest leads to several of the border disputes with India, when the British grabbed pieces of Tibet when the Qing dynasty was unravelling. Then there's Mongolia, which the ROC claims is part of its territory... but most of the world recognizes as a separate country. -- 76.65.128.252 (talk) 12:10, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Right, I didn't know. So what about PRC-Mongolia? Mutual recognition there or not? Evlekis (Евлекис) (argue) 13:14, 20 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes, since the 60's. -- 76.65.128.252 (talk) 03:29, 21 August 2012 (UTC)


 * Thanks for that. Evlekis (Евлекис) (argue) 21:56, 21 August 2012 (UTC)

controlled and administered by Japan?
It's an unoccupied island with decent claim from both china taiwan and japan. Why does the article say it's controlled by Japan. It is in conflict of it's own information. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.99.131.84 (talk) 02:50, 16 September 2012 (UTC)
 * The same question was posted to Talk:Senkaku Islands with an editor on that page providing an response. --Marc Kupper&#124;talk 20:57, 16 September 2012 (UTC)

Declassified U.S. document from June 7, 1971
This Japan Times article reports on "declassified U.S. documents" and later in the article "According to the U.S. document, dated June 7, 1971, China started claiming sovereignty over the Senkakus in December 1970 and Taiwan in February 1971."

The December 1970 China claim seems supported by this NY Times article from December 06, 1970. I have not looked for the full text of this article. Note that NYT article is already being used as a source for the WP article and so if someone adds material based on it they can ref-name to the existing ref.

I suspect it would be useful to track down whatever the "declassified U.S. documents" are as they can be used as reliable, and contemporaneous, sources for dating actions taken by the various countries. At present the WP article has conflicting data on the dates. It's anywhere from 1970, 1971, December 1971, "mid 1970s", etc. We could use the Japan Times article as a source but it may not be considered a reliable source by some editors.

Unfortunately, the NY Times archive search is down at the moment. This Google News search for Nov 1, 1970–Apr 1, 1971 has five hits:
 * Dec 6, 1970 NY Times - China asserts sovereignty.
 * Jan 8, 1971 Christian Science Monitor - China sends warnings to Taiwan, Japan, and South Korea about the islands. I had not realized South Korea was also involved.
 * Jan 30, 1971 reports oil is the main issue.
 * Feb 22, 1971 NY Times abstract does not show why this article was included the search results.
 * Mar 24, 1971 Michigan Daily has casual mention of Senkaku.

This search result and not find anything that supported the February 1971 date for Taiwan but then I was only looking at the abstracts and not the full articles.

An an attempt to find the declassified report using Google for 'Senkaku "December 1970" "February 1971"' finds some interesting stuff but I did not see the report off hand. --Marc Kupper&#124;talk 22:16, 16 September 2012 (UTC)

Historical development
Recently Sspalfilter extensively added Chinese protests against Japanese nationalization of the islands. It describes the events day by day with detailed places. As Wikipedeia is not a newspaper, It should be re-write succinctly or temporaly removed until the outcome of this events become clear. Also, Historical development in 2011 / 2012 should be reviewed and removed non-significant events. ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 10:26, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

I noticed an article 2012 China anti-Japanese demonstrations was created. Then the protests in this article should be a summary of the events and the details should be moved to the article.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 10:32, 17 September 2012 (UTC)


 * You're correct on both counts. For the second (2011/2012), I'd say anyone could start to make those edits, so long as they do it neutrally. For the most recent stuff, it might be easiest to wait a few days, see where things stand (in the real world), and start to trim from there. Yes, WP:NOTNEWS and WP:UNDUE mean that anyone could start cutting it right now, but I wonder if perhaps we might have less edit warring if we wait for a slight perspective. Along with that, however, I'd that people would refrain from adding any more information. However, I'm certainly not going to revert if you (Phoenix7777) or someone else wants to start cutting now. Qwyrxian (talk) 10:33, 17 September 2012 (UTC)
 * (Edit conflict): I would instead say we should delete the other article. Let me get working on that first before we start moving stuff there. Qwyrxian (talk) 10:33, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

Paragraph style
Does anyone else find it odd that the section on historical development is entirely in point form. Shouldn't it be converted into paragraph style?VR talk  02:41, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

United States Position in Dispute
I have edited the intro to this article, which had included the false statement that the United States adopted a neutral position in this dispute. It most certainly not as anyone can confirm from a quick Net search. The U.S. recognizes Japan's sovereignty over the islands and has even stated that they fall within the scope of the U.S. Japan Security Treaty. For example:  Gunnermanz (talk) 06:53, 21 August 2012 (UTC)
 * The US Has a security treaty with Taiwan, what if Taiwan were to invade the islands? -- 76.65.128.252 (talk) 09:00, 21 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Not a relevant discussion point--all we care are what reliable sources say. And if the sources claim that the U.S. has said that they are taking sides, then that's what we have to report. Although something I'd be personally curious to find out, off-wiki. Qwyrxian (talk) 09:46, 21 August 2012 (UTC)
 * The reliable source for the US position is the US Department of State. And State spokespeople have repeatedly said that "on the Senkaku issue... we don’t take any position on that one".  One can, of course, ask how are the Chinese (in either Beijing or Taipei) going to ever take de facto control of the islands away from Japan unless Japan agrees given that an attempt to seize control by force could trigger war with the United States but that's another issue.--Brian Dell (talk) 08:10, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Which would seem to be in direct contradiction to "U.S. says Senkaku Islands fall within scope of Japan-U.S. security treaty

WASHINGTON, July 10, Kyodo The Japanese-controlled Senkaku Islands ... fall within the scope of the 1960 Japan-U.S. security treaty which requires the country to defend Japan in the event of armed attacks, a senior State Department official said Monday. "The Senkakus would fall within the scope of Article 5 of the 1960 U.S.-Japan Treaty of Mutual Cooperation and Security because the Senkaku Islands have been under the administrative control of the government of Japan since they were returned as part of the reversion of Okinawa in 1972," the official told Kyodo News." HammerFilmFan (talk) 08:19, 11 September 2012 (UTC)
 * It may be good to add in a bit from the US perspective on what is currently going on, seeing as how their stance is a big issue. The US defense secretary has said "It is in everybody's interest … for Japan and China to maintain good relations and to find a way to avoid further escalation," on the issue. --Skaafeng (talk) 03:33, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

Why has my recent comment on this page been deleted without any explanation? If I suspect bias on this page I will report it to higher Wiki authorities. Please restore my comments or I will do so. --Gunnermanz (talk) 16:01, 21 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Because your comment had nothing to do with improving the article. Per WP:NOTFORUM, talk pages are not here to discuss the subject of the article. They exist only to discuss improvements to that article. If you want to debate the international policy decisions of Asian countries, please find a website that specializes in such things. Qwyrxian (talk) 23:52, 21 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Talk_page_guidelines: "you should not edit or delete the comments of other editors without their permission".--Brian Dell (talk) 08:10, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
 * WP:NOTFORUM overrides that, especially on controversial subjects, and even more so on articles under ARBCOM sanctions. While I wouldn't do it here, as a highly involved editor, I do it all the time on other talk pages. Qwyrxian (talk) 08:33, 25 August 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes, everyone should be very familiar with WP:NOTFORUM and be aware any editor can remove soapboxing and attempts to utilize the TP's for a forum immediately.HammerFilmFan (talk) 08:01, 11 September 2012 (UTC)

Edit request: Arguments from PRC and ROC
I want to request an edit of this part:


 * The two governments of China first made their claims during the mid-1970s after a 1968 study by experts discovered that oil reserves might be found under the sea near the Senkaku Islands.

The sentence is correct, but it is also a little bit misleading. The PRC and ROC didn´t begin to claim the islands, because of the oil reserves, but because both governments thought that the US would give these islands to the PRC or ROC till 1971. They began to claim it at the end of 1971, when Japan made it public that Japan and the US regard the Senkaku Islands as Japan´s territory (Okinawa Reversion Treaty).

I would prefer to change it into this:


 * After the transfer of administration from the United States to Japan in December 1971 with the Okinawa Reversion Treaty Japan's sovereignty claims over the islands has been disputed by the People's Republic of China (PRC) and the Republic of China (ROC, commonly known as Taiwan).

The oil discovery is already mentioned in part: Alternative approaches

Mr.Helfer (talk) 22:34, 17 September 2012 (UTC)
 * The same request was posted to Talk:Senkaku Islands. Please discuss there. ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 04:37, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

Protests in Los Angeles, Chicago, and Houston?
Can somebody please remove the erroneous information indicating that there were anti-Japan protests in Los Angeles, Houston, and Chicago? The only one that can be confirmed were the several thousand in San Francisco. But nothing for the other cities. Especially Los Angeles. If there was a protest in Los Angeles, it somehow escaped the notice of every major news agency in this city. I actually live in Los Angeles and have heard nothing about any anti-Japan protests outside of China Daily. Especially dubious given the CD's status as a PRC propaganda organ and its very vague description of this alleged protest. CurryTime7-24 (talk) 22:57, 17 September 2012 (UTC)


 * I'm not going to edit the article myself, since it always becomes messy, but here's a Taiwanese newspaper article on a protest in New York:
 * CNA, 18 September 2012, ROC, PRC flags fly together at anti-Japan protest in NY, The China Post
 * Regards, --  李博杰  &#124; —Talk contribs email 00:23, 18 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, how about removing the mentions of Los Angeles at the very least? Seems like a lot of pro PRC people have taken control of this page... CurryTime7-24 (talk) 18:51, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

Effects in industry the recent developments in the dispute have created
It might be a good idea to make include something about how companies such as Canon and Panasonic  are closing down operations in a number of their Chinese factories due to the growing amount of rioting. If anyone can find any issues for Chinese based companies, that would be wonderful. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Skaafeng (talk • contribs) 03:39, 18 September 2012 (UTC)

Some interesting news in Japan
Found this article. Thought that it may be of interest.

I also found this about anti-Japan protests in Taiwan. Ominae (talk) 08:00, 19 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Please see WP:NOTNEWSPAPER. They are not important, but trivial. Oda Mari (talk) 09:11, 19 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Hm. I thought that they'd be good reference for some response to the protests in China. Except for the Taiwan bit. Ominae (talk) 20:41, 19 September 2012 (UTC)

Images
Isn't it odd that all images in this article seems support Japanese side? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 218.22.21.3 (talk) 10:24, 13 September 2012 (UTC)
 * I partially. I think the first thing we should remove are the pictures of the documents--they have absolutely no value to 99% of en.wiki readers (maybe they belong in ja.wiki or cn.wiki, but not here), and the point seems to be to provide extra weight to the Japanese claims. However, on the maps, we have 2 maps in the main body--one supporting the Chinese position, and one supporting the Japanese position. That seems like a fair balance. I don't think they're strictly necessary, but having one in each part does give more visual substance to the articles, so keeping them is fine. Plus I think we should keep the main photo at the top, as a descriptive photo of one of the islands, which has no POV either way. Qwyrxian (talk) 12:08, 13 September 2012 (UTC)
 * NPOV does not call for having half of the images in an article about a controversial topic "support" one perspective while half of them "support" the opposing view. I am restoring the imagery as "neutrality" is being confused with "balance" here.  I do not agree with the apparent generalization that foreign language media has "absolutely no value" simply because it is foreign language.  A violation of WP:IMAGE is cited in the edit summary yet it is not clear just what the alleged violation is.--Brian Dell (talk) 09:46, 17 September 2012 (UTC)
 * There is imagery supporting the Chinese view here. This should be uploaded to the Commons as its copyright should have expired and, I believe, included in this article.--Brian Dell (talk) 08:56, 20 September 2012 (UTC)

Lede
In wikipedia articles the lead is supposed to summarize the article. According to the guidelines the lead of this article should be 3-4 paragraphs, even though right now its more like 1.5.

I have added a short sentence on the current protests since many people will come to the article in search of that. Hopefully others can help me in developing the lead further.VR talk  02:46, 18 September 2012 (UTC)


 * I've attempted to make a short summary of the main arguments on both sides. There should be a bit of higher level analysis added, to the effect of seeing the dispute as driven by domestic considerations in China (and perhaps to some extent in Japan), for example.  It may be difficult to say something here that wouldn't be contentious, however.--Brian Dell (talk) 08:25, 20 September 2012 (UTC)

Map
Is there a reason this page does not have a standard, Wikipedia-style map outlining China, Japan, and the islands in dispute? Is there fear that the map will show some kind of bias regarding proper ownership of the islands? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.110.14.5 (talk) 14:25, 20 September 2012 (UTC)

Misspelling of Island Name
In the paragraph:
 * A World Atlas published in October 1965 by the National Defense Research Academy and the China Geological Research Institute of Taiwan records the Diaoyu Islands with Japanese names: Gyochojima (Diaoyu Islands), Taishojima (Chiwei Island), and Senkaku Gunto.[49] In the late 1970s, the government of ROC began to recall these books, but it was too late.[49]

"Gyochojima" should be "Uotsurishima". The Japanese characters are the same but the pronunciation uses the kun-yomi, not the on-yomi as currently noted. See http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E9%AD%9A%E9%87%A3%E5%B3%B6 Please change (currently locked). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 211.131.169.220 (talk) 07:36, 21 September 2012 (UTC)

Counter argument on 1958 PRC map
thumb| A national boundaryⒷ drawn between Taiwan and the Ryukyu Islands excluding the Senkaku IslandsⒶ from the Taiwanese territory in World Atlas published in China in 1958

User:Bdell555 added a counter argument by PRC saying "add Chinese challenge to significance of 1958 map". I don't object the edit itself, however the argument itself made me feel strange. The original text says ".. important information from the map’s colophon: “certain national boundaries are based on maps compiled prior to the Second Sino-Japanese War(1937-1945)." However prior to the Second Sino-Japanese War, there is no national boundary between Taiwan and the Ryukyu Islands because they were both within the Imperial Japan. So there is no obligation for PRC to draw the national boundary between the Taiwan and the Ryukyu Islands prior to the Second Sino-Japanese War. Further, PRC named the allegedly stolen islands in Japanese name "Senkaku Guntō" (Senkaku Islands) and "Uotsuri-Jima" instead of the Chinese name "Diaoyudao", although there is no obligation to use the Japanese name. ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 09:52, 21 September 2012 (UTC)
 * OK, is your point something like this:
 * Japan: This is how you saw the world in 1958. You didn't have a problem with not having these islands back then.
 * China: No, because some of the territorial designations on that map were just ported in from pre-1945 maps
 * Japan: But you drew a line between Taiwan and the Ryukyus. That's not a porting in of an old map.  That's a 1958 decision.
 * If this is your point I actually find it a fairly good one and would concede it to you. If part of the line between China and Japan is necessarily 1958, then surely it all is.  "Certain national boundaries" may be "old", but it is dubious to contend that one of them is both partly old and partly new.  If you put your mind to redraw part of it in order to reflect the post-1945 world, surely you would redraw the whole line if you thought there was also a change between Japan and China in the Senkaku area and not just the Taiwan area.  I added this because that Taiwanese scholar made the argument, but given that this same scholar generally admits that China conceded the islands between 1945 and 1971, there doesn't seem to be a great deal of point fighting for this particular hill anyway when one's conceded the larger battle (although not conceding the war).--Brian Dell (talk) 12:10, 21 September 2012 (UTC)

A good article from NYT on China's claims
Check them out if anyone here have free time. Link here --LLTimes (talk) 00:36, 22 September 2012 (UTC)


 * Qing dynasty's sovereign obligations and rights were not passed on to any subsequent Chinese states. Counter example is the current state of Russia which inherited all the diplomatic and treaty obligations and rights (but not territory) of Soviet Union. Hence any claim based on Chinese dynastic history is moot under international law. One could debate the validity of Japan's claim over these islands. However, it is certain that neither Taiwan or Mainland China have territorial right over the islands. Neither countries inherited sovereign right (and oblitagion) from Qing dynasty. Their current territorial right of mainland china and Taiwan is based on established occupation of "land belonging to no one", which is the result of the disappearence of Qing Dynasty. And since these two countries never controlled Senkaku islands, they have no claim. America, which actually controlled and administered the island before Japan probably have better claim than them. Vapour (talk) 23:02, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Vapour, that's your own personal original research, and has no business here. However, the NYT "article" doesn't either--Kristof is an opinion editor, an analyst if you will, and not a reliable source for political claims. Qwyrxian (talk) 01:17, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * If there are any China claims in the article lacking a citation, then the NYTimes piece might be useful simply as a baseline source. Cla68 (talk) 01:20, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Again, it's not a New York Times piece--it's a New York opinion piece. If fact, it's not even by Kristof--its the opinion of a "researcher" working at a think tank in Taiwan. Nothing in it is reliable for factual claims. Even something by Kristof himself would be of borderline value, and then only for the most obvious, undeniable facts, things that we can probably source elsewhere. Now that I see that it's not even Kristof writing, I'll have to remove the stuff talked about in the section above. Qwyrxian (talk) 03:18, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Qwyrxian, I disagree. That column is a great source for China's side in the debate.  I think the source should be used for that purpose, and Vapour and LLTimes appear to agree with me. Cla68 (talk) 03:54, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Not a chance. It's an opinion piece. By a think tank writer. That's NEVER a reliable source. You can't declare an opinion piece to be RS by consensus. Do you really need me to take this to WP:RSN? That piece has literally no more validity than, say, a personal blog. Actually, it has less, because we know the author is writing from a think tank. You're a smart editor, you do great work on Wikipedia. I honestly don't understand how you can even consider defending this. Qwyrxian (talk) 04:42, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Please feel free to take it to WP:RSN. They will likely say that the column is a reliable source for Kristof's opinion.  So, if the source is used and you want to attribute it to Mr. Kristoff, that's fine.  What's important is that the content in the article which elucidates China's side on the issue be verifiable, which means it needs to be linked to a reliable secondary source, such as a newspaper column. Cla68 (talk) 04:52, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Actually it is two separate questions. While the current administrators is certainly Japan and it is wrong for China or Taiwan to take any unilateral action, military or not, to take it back by force. Whether the islands belong to in the future is another question. The latter question should best be settled peacefully through the ICJ. Do not confuse the two questions, Cla68 and Vapour, please.

The On the Ground is an opinion page of Nicholas D. Kristof. Acoording to the WP:NEWSBLOG an article written in the page is reliable as long as the article was written by Kristof himself. However The page accommodates articles submitted by readers. The article in question was written by a Research Fellow of Taiwanese university. And other articles were written by a sophomore at Yale University and a mentor to many in the South Sudanese government. These articles submitted by readers are unreliable per WP:NEWSBLOG. The description Qwyrxian removed was already refuted by me in the section above. ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 08:26, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * Cla68, I think you're confused, and Phoenix7777 is getting to that point here. The one that I removed was not by Kristof. It is the one at the top of this section, and it was written by Han-Yi Shaw, who is described as "a Research Fellow at the Research Center for International Legal Studies, National Chengchi University, in Taipei, Taiwan". While I do object to Kristof in general, I wouldn't outright remove it without RSN or consensus. I removed this one due to the clearly partisan nature of the source. As far as I can tell, guest bloggers are allowed to publish opinion pieces (and note that the section of the NYT is clearly labelled opinion), and it's one of those that I removed. I left in the article by Kristof himself, which, though it's an opinion piece, is only being used to verify the Taiwanese spelling in the lead sentence. If we were to include things of more questionable "accuracy", we'd, at a minimum, have to say something like "According to Nicholas Kristof...". Qwyrxian (talk) 08:48, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm not confused. It's not a self-published article.  It was published in the opinion pages of the NY Times.  I still believe it can be used as a source for the Chinese positions elucidated in this article. Cla68 (talk) 04:30, 28 September 2012 (UTC)

Xinhua news article
As a follow-on to the conversation above, here is a good article which elucidates China's position on this dispute from Xinhua News Agency. The full text of the PRC's "white paper" is here. Cla68 (talk) 07:25, 26 September 2012 (UTC)
 * I think that the white paper would be a good source for China's official positions--more accurate then reading them second-hand, filtered through academics. That is, not for provided a "correct" "historical" analysis (I wouldn't allow the Japan's MOFA that position either), but a good, concise description of what the government of China believes is correct. I don't have time to read it over at the moment, and I'm sure some of it is already included in the article, but it definitely seems like a good source for this article. Qwyrxian (talk) 00:30, 2 October 2012 (UTC)

WP:NPOV
In the interests of neutrality, it would be desirable to retain an impartial name for this article. Neither 'Senkaku Islands dispute' nor 'Diaoyu Islands dispute' are satisfactory in this context; a satisfactory name should be found. --  Ohconfucius  ping / poke 15:20, 1 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Per an arbitration case ruling, we've been told that we aren't permitted to discuss any name changes until 2013. --  李博杰  &#124; —Talk contribs email 16:00, 1 October 2012 (UTC)
 * (ec) Please read the notices at the top of this page. Thank you. Oda Mari (talk) 16:04, 1 October 2012 (UTC)

Potsdam Declaration and Cairo Communique - the heart of the dispute in international law
The explanation of the argument based on the Potsdam Declaration makes no sense without including also a reference to the Cairo Communique of 1943 (the relevant part of which was to be implemented in the Potsdam Declaration). The critical words in the Cairo Communique are, quoting verbatim: "all the territories Japan has stolen from the Chinese, such as Manchuria, Formosa, and The Pescadores, shall be restored to the Republic of China". So in international law, the real dispute is whether the islands were accurately described after 1895 as "territories Japan has stolen from the Chinese". That is the relevance of Japan's terra nullius argument. If the islands were terra nullius in 1895 then they cannot have been "stolen from the Chinese", and furthermore they could not have been "restored" to China at end of WWII. On the other hand, if the islands were not terra nullius in 1895 then they would be covered by the Cairo Communique whether or not they were formally part of "Formosa", noting the use of the words "such as" in the Cairo Communique meaning that Manchuria, Formosa and The Pescadores was not an exhaustive list. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 141.0.39.82 (talk) 16:08, 25 September 2012 (UTC)
 * There is "no date", "no signature(of the 3 leaders)", and "no ratification". The Cairo Declaration is merely a "Joint statement". Originally, the Cairo Declaration is a statement for the WWI. Has nothing to do with the Sino-Japanese War. Above all, Potsdam Declaration is unrelated. First of all, the Potsdam Declaration is also a declaration and to guarantee the "basic human rights" and "freedom of thought & speech" of the Japanese people. When the riot, Chinese harm to innocent Japanese, the China have broken the Potsdam Declaration themselves. Look who's talking!?Wingwrong ★ ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ 03:15, 5 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Wikipedia is not a forum, and talk pages are not to be used as such. Furthermore, your the tone that you give with lines such as "Look who's talking!?" provide the impression that you're here to pick a fight. Please refrain from doing so in the future. Editors should be here to build an encyclopedia, and not fight their own battles here; talk pages are for improvements to the article, and not general discussion. --  李博杰  &#124; —Talk contribs email 07:15, 5 October 2012 (UTC)
 * I had forgotten. That's right. I'm sorry.Wingwrong ★ ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ 07:22, 5 October 2012 (UTC)

The San Francisco Treaty was signed in 1951, not in 1945. In 1945 Japan signed the Instrument of Surrender, unconditionally surrendered to US, China, Soviet Union and Britain, its territories are limited to the four major islands, Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu and Shikoku, and nearby islands. Since then Diaoyu Island has no longer been Japanese territory, it was part of Yi Lan County of Taiwan. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Johnz002 (talk • contribs) 16:10, 17 October 2012 (UTC)


 * Anyone else think this section is in need of hatting/archiving? It's not productive to improving the article. Qwyrxian (talk) 00:31, 18 October 2012 (UTC)

Senkaku Islands
More Information about Senkaku Island. Talk:Senkaku_Islands — Preceding unsigned comment added by Adri Valdez (talk • contribs) 09:45, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Japan to question inconsistency in China's claim over Senkakus
Japan plans to question China's inconsistency in its claims over a group of Japanese-controlled islands in the East China Sea as a way to drum up international support for its stance amid the heated territorial row, Foreign Ministry officials said Thursday.

Japan will aim to disprove Beijing's claim that it has long fought to protect its sovereignty over the islands by stressing that China did not lodge any protest against Japan concerning the sovereignty over the islands until the early 1970s, they said.

The government plan comes after Tokyo's recent shift in its public relations policy to actively promote its position on the territorial row, reflecting China's growing assertiveness over its claim.

Prior to the policy shift, Japan has been reluctant to publicize the dispute, given its position that the Senkakus are an integral part of the country and therefore no dispute exists.

It is "the Chinese side's greatest contradiction" that it did not object to Japan's sovereignty over the islands until the 1970s, a government source said. KYODO NEWS(共同通信) Oct. 4, 2012 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wingwrong (talk • contribs) 14:17, 4 October 2012 (UTC)
 * This doesn't seem worth including--it's just saying "Japan's going to start talking and stuff". Or, alternatively, "Japan has a new plan to try to gain support for its claims." I don't know that that's anything other than, basically, a government press release. Qwyrxian (talk) 14:26, 4 October 2012 (UTC)
 * I want to write "China did not lodge any protest against Japan concerning the sovereignty over the islands from 1895 until the early 1970s".Wingwrong ★ ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ 00:36, 5 October 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't think you can do so using that source, given that it is Japan's position that China did not do so, not something from independent sources (see the discussion above, for instance, that claims that China always assumed that the islands were being "returned"). Please note, I'm not objecting to the underlying point, but to the source you're recommending we use. Qwyrxian (talk) 01:26, 5 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Everyone will understand if everyone read the details. However, I think to be understand more intuitive at placing in the LIST. "FROM" is the important word.Wingwrong ★ ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ 02:32, 5 October 2012 (UTC)
 * The lead already says something similar to what you propose: "Japan argues that it surveyed the islands in the late 19th century... subsequently China acquiesced to Japanese sovereignty until the 1970s". This formulation makes it clear that this is Japan's argument, and not an undisputed fact. I see the "Japanese position" section is very extensive, including many of the Japanese government's cherry-picked Chinese maps that supposedly show the islands as Japanese. Our article does not mention the fact that for example, the 1958 map according to Han-Yi Shaw has a disclaimer that some boundaries are based on those prior to Japanese WWII retrocession. It does mention the PRC's claim that the occupying Americans suppressed Chiang Kai-Shek's protests.


 * This article is missing a lot of context about Sino-Japanese relations from 1945 to 1972. The Maoist government's foreign policy was based on proletarian internationalism, and therefore what nationalist claims China could afford to delay or suppress, it did. Plus, China desperately needed Japanese development money. Oh, and the little fact that the United States held the disputed islands during that time (this article, like OP, deemphasizes this point and pretends that there was some unbroken and unquestioned line of Japanese sovereignty against which China could have, and should have, protested); the US was equivocal about who it would return them to. Also, the 1970s saw a lot of maritime disputes flare, and not only for reasons of oil. Vietnam and the Philippines occupied many of the Spratly Islands; they were rewarded with a subsequent "peaceful code of conduct" crystallizing these conquests, while China got nothing for its peaceful protests.


 * The upshot is that although many people have posted links in talk to a fairly limited number of sources about the Chinese position, nobody has gone through and quoted its content as extensively as the Japan Ministry of Foreign Affairs' propaganda is referenced in this article. As a result, there is confusion between Japanese government assertions and facts. Shrigley (talk) 08:04, 5 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Please see above . Han-Yi Shaw's claim was already refuted. I will add Wingwrong's request based on the Korean scholar's book.
 * "The Chinese/Taiwanese virtual inaction over the Senkaku Islands during the material periods might have strong implications of abandonment, considering the following facts and assumptions: first, literally no actions/activities were taken by the Chinese/Taiwanese side at The material periods, in particular during the post-World War II era, including the period of the Drafting of the San Francisco Peace Treaty, second, considerable Japanese activities over the Senkaku Islands, which had certain manifestations of the exercise of state sovereignty and third, it appears that only the reports on the possible existence of substantial petroleum Resources over the disputed area awakened, and further reminded, the Chinese/Taiwanese side Of the existence of the Senkaku Islands. This is more so that Japanese activities over the Senkaku Islands were consistently maintained during the critical periods of the territorial Arrangements in the post-WorldWar II era."
 * ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 08:57, 5 October 2012 (UTC)
 * P.S. The maps I added was based on the Taiwanese scholars of Academia Sinica, the most prestigious institution in Taiwan not " the Japanese government's cherry-picked Chinese maps".
 * ―― Phoenix7777 (talk)
 * Also Han-Yi Shaw lied the description of a Chinese old document "Diaoyu Island accommodates ten or more large ships". The description in the picture wrote " Diaoyutai harbor is deep, it accommodates a thousand of large ships." Apparently it referred to a different place to Senkaku Islands. ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 10:29, 5 October 2012 (UTC)

Counter argument
This article is very contentious and there were many edit wars. So the argument from each party should be contained in Chinese/Japanese position section even a counter argument to other party's argument. Although it may decrease the readability, it is the best way to avoid unnecessary edit war.

I know there are many counter argument to the 1953 The People's Daily argument and this time one of those was added although it is not persuasive at all. I suggest to add a list of the counter arguments in Chinese position section. ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 21:42, 6 October 2012 (UTC)


 * I disagree with that form of organization. I think the article makes more sense if we categorize the types of arguments, as is done at Sea of Japan naming dispute. We never choose the style of writing an article to decrease edit wars. And, in any event, I don't think there's anything you could possibly do to stop edit warring on this page, apart from getting the participants to behave appropriately. Qwyrxian (talk) 02:59, 7 October 2012 (UTC)


 * I don't think Sea of Japan naming dispute includes the counter argument in both "Argument of Japan/Korea" sections. I said "it may decrease the readability", however a result of "counter arguments" to "counter arguments" and so on makes the argument unrecognizable. This is because the last counter argument seems to win the argument. An example is Kofun period. If the edit I moved to the "Chinese position" stayed in the Japanese argument, the Japanese argument seems to be refuted, although the edit is not persuasive at all. Anyway the sections are each party's position, a counter should be described in each party's position. There are several books explaining the both nation's positions in separate sections, there is no counter argument in that sections. It is because such form of organization makes the point of contention unclear. If the section is named "Argument of both nations", counter arguments should be appended to an argument from one nation. I think the separate section of each party's positions greatly benefit to reducing edit wars.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 04:28, 7 October 2012

Who was actually the private owner
I could not find any evidence about the private ownership. Would be nice to know who had sell it and from which country... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 116.226.36.200 (talk) 14:37, 8 October 2012 (UTC)
 * See Senkaku Islands. Please do not ask this kind of question at here. Ask at Reference desk. This page is used to discuss improvements to the article Senkaku Islands dispute. Thank you. Oda Mari (talk) 17:17, 8 October 2012 (UTC)

U.S. Senate reaffirms defense of Senkakus under Japan-U.S. pact
Please see the following for details : http://english.kyodonews.jp/news/2012/11/196783.html This means Senkaku Island is included in the Mutual Security Commitment between United States and Japan to deter any military aggression from People's Republic of China, which is also beneficiary to Taiwan. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 1.164.32.79 (talk) 02:48, 1 December 2012 (UTC)
 * I added the fact to the United States' position section. ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 20:11, 18 December 2012 (UTC)

Geology and bigotry
Okay, so. Recently I added some content, which for the most part briefly documented the Chinese geological argument (which wasn't on the article, despite it containing Japanese refutations and allusions to that argument(!)); User:Oda Mari then reverted me, asking for a "talk page... consensus" before making a change. I thought this was unreasonable, since I don't think what I added was particularly controversial, and Oda Mari didn't have any specific grievances with the text. I restored my changes, adding a bit more to them, which was promptly reverted by User:Hammersbach for the same reason. Hammersbach also attacked me in the edit summary as having a "pro-Chinese POV", and followed me onto a different article where he called my well-reasoned creation of a redirect, "nothing more than a shallow attempt by a POV editor to game the system."

Where's the good faith? Part of creating a successful neutral article is documenting all relevant points of view, as documented by reliable sources. Documenting, say, China's submission of a geological argument to the United Nations, and a brief explication of that argument, does not contravene our neutrality policies. I don't think it even takes a particularly "pro-Chinese" editor to do it, although it does alarm me that with so many people hawkishly watching this page (and presumably following the relevant news), nobody cared to add what I just did to the article. There's no requirement that a "consensus" of editors has to personally agree with content for it to be added to an article. If you guys want to make some argument that my addition contravenes policy, I can answer that. But please, let's not throw around ethnic and national slurs. Shrigley (talk) 05:02, 26 December 2012 (UTC)


 * It's part of the reason why I stopped giving a shit about "____ dispute" articles. The article development method used in places like this aren't constructive collaboration, but whoever can get the most men working on a page. Here, people don't use logical arguments, they just point to the 1RR notice at the top and say "please talk about your edit first", even though they can't actually point out anything bad about the edit. I've tried to distance myself from being part of the plague some time ago, though I still watch most of them quite closely. --  李博杰  &#124; —Talk contribs email 05:25, 26 December 2012 (UTC)


 * Shrigley: I think you are right to point out that "there's no requirement that a "consensus" of editors has to personally agree with content for it to be added to an article". I think those editors should at least provide their reason and justification for reverting your changes, and why, in the case of Hammersbach, the changes you've made is POV. 98.210.64.2 (talk) 06:57, 26 December 2012 (UTC)

There are certainly problems with the edits.
 * 1) The continental shelf has nothing to do with the sovereignty over the islands. It is only related to the EEZ. The deceptive edit as if it supports the Chinese sovereignty over the islands is unacceptable. If China believes it is the reasoning of the sovereignty, the description "China has a position that an islands on the Chinese continental shelf is under the sovereignty of China contrary to the international law" should be added.
 * 2) Regarding the edit about "effective control", The description is deceptive. The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs never said anything but an official of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that Chinese Navy vessels pass the area on their way to the Pacific and that Chinese nationals sometimes land on the islands. Yet he also admits that Japan exercises effective control, at least temporarily. The quote "the fact that Japan may occupy the islands now does not prejudice the possibility of Chinese control in the future" is an opinion by "many Chinese interviewees". If Chinese government said so, it proves China is a rogue nation. I temporarily link the source Shrigley provided.

Linking here removed by owner due to misuse of link sent privately only for downloading. Online link being deleted for this misuse.--macropneuma 11:20, 26 December 2012 (UTC)


 * 3. Removing the direct quote of Acting Deputy Spokesperson Patrick Ventrell is not acceptable.
 * ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 10:44, 26 December 2012 (UTC)


 * Since you apparently have access to the Hagstrom article which I cited, you would have known that it directly connects the geology issue with the sovereignty issue. It isn't me that's being "deceptive" as to its relevance! pp.165-166: From that time on, the Chinese argument from history has been supplemented by one based on geology, emphasizing ‘natural prolongation’. The main argument [blah blah blah]. They [the Pinnacle Islands] would thus naturally belong to China (Beijing Review 39, 1996: 10). If this wasn't clear, I also put in the article On December 14, 2012, China submitted a 11-page report[...] to the United Nations, arguing [...] Diaoyu Islands, is a natural extension of China's land territory. cited to a UPI report. It's undoubtedly relevant. And if that wasn't enough, before I made a single edit to this article, it quoted Seokwoo Lee to say "Thus, for Japan, none of the alleged historical, geographical and geological arguments set forth by China/Taiwan are acceptable as valid under international law to substantiate China's territorial claim over the Senkaku Islands." Wait, what? What geological argument as to sovereignty? How could an article that quotes refutations of China's geological claims, without even explicating that claim itself, claim to be a neutral article?
 * Your rhetoric is extremely inflammatory when you say that I'm being "deceptive" when I shorten "an official from the Ministry to Foreign Affairs" to "Ministry of Foreign Affairs", which is an easily fixable oversight. And "proves China is a rogue nation"? Come on. I always followed the wording in the source which emphasized that (p.171) "Chinese officials... are rather vigilant against the rhetoric of ‘effective control’": meaning they sometimes dispute it, sometimes acknowledge it, but always challenge the relevance of that argument based on 'effective control'. As for the interviewees, they include the subjects that I included first, MOFA officials and Yan Xuetong. See footnote 29: Interview with an MFA official central to the PRC’s Japan policy, 19 March 2001, Beijing; interviews with Professor Zhang Yunling, 2 April 2001, Beijing; Professor Li Guojiang, 3 April 2001, Beijing; and Professor Yang Bojiang, 9 April 2001, Beijing; cf. interview with a former MFA official and senior research fellow at the China Institute of International Relations, 16 March 2001, Beijing.
 * There's no need to quote Ventrell because what he said could be summarized easily: "We’ve raised our concerns with the Chinese Government"; i.e., they lodged a diplomatic protest, and "U.S. policy and commitments... are longstanding and have not changed"; i.e. there's nothing novel.
 * Shrigley (talk) 17:36, 26 December 2012 (UTC)


 * 1. I know some Chinese claim such argument, however I don't understand logically why the continental shelf has anything to do with the sovereignty of the islands. However I know why this argument is not in the official position of China, " Diaoyu Dao, an Inherent Territory of China", People's Daily and CCTV. If they link the continental shelf and territorial dispute, the logic become so ridiculous that it cannot be accepted by the international communities. The "geographical and geological arguments" in the Seokwoo Lees book is a citation from MOFAJ (emphasis added) and not about the continental shelf but the geographical proximity. None of the arguments that the Chinese government or Taiwanese authorities have presented as historical, geographic or geological grounds is valid evidence under international law to support the Chinese assertion of its territorial sovereignty over the Senkaku Islands. Under international law, for example, the discovery of an island or geographical proximity alone does not evidence the assertion of territorial sovereignty. Why don't you add the geographical proximity argument in the Chinese position? This is a low level nationalist's propaganda for the ignorant Chinese people.


 * 2. Please see the footnote 26.(emphasis added) Interview with an MFA official central to the PRC’s Japan policy... It is not "officials" but an official. The footnote 29 also says "an official". Your portion of quote says an official of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The description should be attributed to "an official" per WP:ATTRIBUTEPOV in order to distinguish it from the "Official MFA statement". Your edit is They also say that the fact that Japan may occupy the islands now does not prejudice the possibility of Chinese control in the future. While the source says they acknowledge that Japan practically ‘controls’ or ‘occupies’ the islands for now. However, they also stress that this state of affairs has no implications whatsoever for sovereignty over the islands. The words does not prejudice the possibility of Chinese control in the future. is your creation and original research. The expression is too provocative. I will accept if you change the words to They also say that the fact that Japan may occupy the islands now has no implication for sovereignty over the islands as the source says although the necessity of this trivial Chinese position is still questioned.


 * 3. The quote is important because it emphasize the U.S. concern. It is quite unusual for U.S. to raise(d) our concerns with the Chinese Government directly I think these necessary/unnecessary discussion is barren. It continues forever. The description should be left as is.
 * ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 20:34, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

Status Quo
Why the status quo changed? Apparently both sides (Chinese and Japanese governments) agreed to maintain the status quo (Japan has the actual control of the disputed islands, but no party would actually claim or occupy the islands.) It worked then in 1972, why the change in 2012? Apparently the "next generation" is not wiser, as hoped by Deng Xiao Ping, Chinese former leader. Why don't your articles have more details on this status quo change in 2012 that is potentially leading to a major conflict? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Zhoufg 99 (talk • contribs) 03:23, 30 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Because what you say is not supported by reliable sources. Japan has claimed control over the islands since 1895, and this has never changed. Now, if you have some sort of info from reliable sources that you want to discuss, feel free to raise them. Qwyrxian (talk) 06:15, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

Question about the recent major edit
Shrigley, you added "China refutes the claim that the islands were terra nullius, by reference to continuous contact with the Diaoyu Islands since at least 1372..." in the "Beginnings" sub-section. I don't think the placement is appropriate as there was no protest from China at that time. I think it should be added to the "Chinese (PRC) and Taiwanese (ROC) positions" sub-section with the date when China said it. Oda Mari (talk) 08:22, 26 December 2012 (UTC)
 * I didn't say that China refuted the terra nullius argument at the time, or else I would have used the past tense: "China refuted the claim", instead of the present tense, which clearly indicates a present response to a present argument. And while I agree, having a better understanding of the article structure, since we're separating "Japanese position" and "Chinese position" that it should be in Chinese, it is definitely presented in my source as a response to terra nullius rather than an independent argument: It is disputed whether at that point the islands were terra nullius, as argued by Japan, or an integral part of Chinese territory. Given the contemporary modes of acquisition, many analysts argue that there is indeed substance to China’s historical claim. The history of Chinese contact with the islands can be traced back to at least 1372 (Blanchard 2000: 101; Suganuma 2000: 42–4). [Fisherman shelters, coastal defense, Cixi sold, Ryukyu investiture Chinese navigation aid]... Circumstances like these are taken to refute the idea that the Pinnacle Islands were ‘no man’s land’ in the late nineteenth century (Cheng 1974: 253–60; Chiu 1996/97: 19–20; Matsui 1997: 11; Suganuma 2000: Ch. 2). By the way, as proof that I am dedicated to building a neutral article, and didn't merely quote selectively, I also included the Japanese response to that argument (does that make me "pro-Japanese"? Head asplode!) Some Japanese authors reject such arguments since, even if they were taken seriously, they make up ‘far less than the standard required by international law at that time’ (Matsui 1997: 13; cf. Cheng 1974: 260–1). Shrigley (talk) 17:36, 26 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Why should the Chinese POV be in the Beginnings section? Only a fact should be in the section. The description Japan incorporated the islands under the administration of Okinawa, stating that it had conducted surveys since 1884 and that the islands were terra nullius is a fact regardless of whether the  terra nullius is a fact or not. The addition is clearly a POV argument, so it should go into the Chinese positions section. The Beginnings section is not for the argument of both side, Any refutation should go into the respective POV sections.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 02:05, 28 December 2012 (UTC)
 * On this point I have to agree with Shirgley. Just like it is a "fact" that Japan claimed explicitly in 1884 that the islands were terra nullius, it is also a "fact" that China claims that the islands were not. In any event, anything that we can do to get rid of the big "Japan's argument"/"China's argument" organization is a good step, as that is not how we're supposed to organize dispute articles anyway. Both sides claim a set of facts about whether or not the islands were under any nation's control in 1884; it doesn't matter that China didn't raise those claims at that point (especially given that China wasn't exactly in a position to be making such arguments at that time anyway). Both sets of facts should be listed in an "early history" section. In fact, now that I look at it, the "Beginnings" section is itself a POV label, because it marks the start of the dispute as the moment of Japanese annexaction. In fact, the "beginnings" of the dispute are the 1970s (when China first raised the claim); the historical events that led up to there being a dispute, however, start at different times for the two different POVs. At a minimum, I believe this aspect of Shirgley's edit should be reincorporated; a full reorganization would be better. Qwyrxian (talk) 09:54, 28 December 2012 (UTC)
 * I agree with Qwyrxian that the problem is the section/subsection titles. I suggest The section title "Territorial dispute" should be moved to "Background history" and it should cover the events up until the dispute began in 1970s. Then create a new section "Beginnings of the dispute" or something like that and the next sections would be countries position/arguments. I think it would be more understandable and neutral to cover the events in chronological order. Oda Mari (talk) 15:22, 28 December 2012 (UTC)
 * If people don't mind waiting, I can probably do a major re-org around the second half of January. Qwyrxian (talk) 05:51, 29 December 2012 (UTC)
 * I strongly object Qwyrxian's proposal if you get rid of the big "Japan's argument"/"China's argument" organization. The problem is already raised before. I generally don't care what argument is added to each POV section. (except for Shrigley's addition this time) However any refutation to either party's position is quite sensitive as I said at . If you intended to make a big reorganization of this article, Please discuss before changing this article. ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 11:07, 29 December 2012 (UTC)
 * With all due respect, Phoenix7777, this isn't actually a case for debate, because WP:NPOV explicitly says, "Segregation of text or other content into different regions or subsections, based solely on the apparent POV of the content itself, may result in an unencyclopedic structure, such as a back-and-forth dialogue between proponents and opponents." The current article violates this portion of NPOV, and the only real reason it hasn't been fixed is the difficulty of the problem and the long-term editing problems. But we really should divide this up much more like Sea of Japan naming dispute, where arguments are categorized by type, not by position. Furthermore, the "historical development" section is, to put it mildly, crap. On the one hand, it gives undue importance to minor events (especially recent ones, because people always rush to put in info about whatever's in the news today). On the other hand, organizing by time frame fails to adequately show the dispute in proper context.
 * Having said that, I would do the re-org in a sandbox first, not work on the article directly, in part because it's going to take a lot of edits and be a mess for a while (so I don't want to disrupt the article over a long period of time), and in part because I am sensitive to the long term problems on this article and the strong feelings people have. I'll do the work in my sandbox first then bring it here for discussion. Qwyrxian (talk) 02:47, 30 December 2012 (UTC)

Your interpretation of the WP:NPOV is inadequate. Pro and con lists is better than thread mode. The thread mode is exactly what I raised a concern about. Wikipedia is not a place to judge the international dispute by integrating the conflicting claims inappropriate way. There are many books adopting "Chinese/Japanese claims" structure.
 * Toward a New Framework for Peaceful Settlement of China's Territorial and Boundary Disputes
 * 5.2.1 Conflicting Claims over the Ownership of the Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands
 * 5.2.1.1 Chinese Claims
 * 5.2.1.2 Japanese Claims


 * Territorial Disputes among Japan, China and Taiwan concerning the Senkaku Islands
 * 3.1 The Respective Claims to Sovereignty over the Senkaku Islands
 * 3.1.1 The Claims of japan to the Senkaku Islands
 * 3.1.2 The Claims of China/Taiwan to the Senkaku Islands

The Sea of Japan naming dispute is far less contentious than this dispute because the Korean claims are quite simple and naïve. So the structure is not useful. Current section structure "Chinese/Japanese position" is perfectly neutral.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 04:13, 4 January 2013 (UTC)
 * The Territorial Dispute over the Tiaoyu/Senkaku Islands: An Update
 * China’s Position
 * Japan’s Position

The Chinese government has seized "750,000 maps of problem"
中国政府が「問題のある地図」７５万点押収

After the WWII, the Chinese government has published many maps that the Senkaku Islands as Japanese territory. However, the Japanese government has never published a map that mean "Senkaku Islands is not the Japanese territory".Wingwrong ★ ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ 08:15, 10 January 2013 (UTC)
 * You can edit without any "approval" here if you have a reliable source to support your claim. I found the following sources.
 * ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 10:52, 11 January 2013 (UTC)
 * ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 10:52, 11 January 2013 (UTC)
 * ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 10:52, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Airspace incursion
I had to make a slight change to the airspace incursion section. Saying as a fact that Chinese planes entered Japan's airspace is to presume that the islands belong to Japan (which we all know I agree with, but which is not a neutral position to take). China, of course, says that the planes just flew through Chinese airspace, since China claims the islands. While the directly linked reference says "Japan's airspace", the other references in the paragraph, as well as quite a number that I read during the actual events, make it clear that this is the first time that Chinese military planes flew through what Japan claims is its airspace. Just a small NPOV thing, but I couldn't quite explain in an edit summary so I had to put it here. Qwyrxian (talk) 15:11, 7 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I disagree with your edit. It's a fact that islands are under Japanese administration and belong to Japan at present. So are the territorial waters and the airspace. What China says are only claims so far. Just saying repeatedly and loudly it's our islands does not mean it's a dispute. That is what china has been doing since 1970s. It's not acceptable under the International law. It's neutral/natural to consider the islands/waters/airspace belong to Japan. Qwyrxian, I understand that you are trying to be neutral and fair, but you are being over-sensitive about it. Oda Mari (talk) 16:48, 7 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I agree with Oda Mari. Chinese claims don't invalidate or undermine Japan's position that its airspace was violated. North Korea refuses to accept South Korea is an independent nation and claims control over the entire Korean peninsula - does that mean Wikipedia should qualify any intrusions of "South Korean" airspace? John Smith&#39;s (talk) 19:10, 7 January 2013 (UTC)
 * By your argument, this article should just say, "However, Japan currently 'controls' the islands, so they belong to Japan." I'm sorry, but the fct that either of you would even consider that to be the neutral position makes me sad, and really makes me doubt any commitment to NPOV. Oda Mari, your claim is even more extreme: you're actually saying that this (or Senkaku Islands) should state that the islands belong to/are owned by/are the territory of Japan. Can you not see how obviously POV that is? Despite the fact that all 3 of us agree that the planes did violate Japans' airspace? And the South Korean claim is different, because, as far as I know, almost every other country in the world recognizes that there are two separate countries on the Korean peninsula, and that the South Korean government legally and legitimately controls the southern portion. As far as I know, though, the only country that has legally recognized Japan's claims to the Senkaku Islands is the United States; no one else really cares (though it wouldn't surprise me to hear that either staunch Chinese allies or Japanese hostiles recognize Chinese claims). Seriously, I'm not kidding here when I say that it makes me sad that you would think that saying it's Japanese airspace is neutral. Qwyrxian (talk) 03:05, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I think "what Japan considers its airspace" is in appropriate because the air space is actually controlled by Japan. Also China recognized the fact although China claims the sovereignty of the islands. The wording "Japanese-controlled airspace" which is used in the source is more appropriate. ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 03:51, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I will explain more logically. Qwyrxian is confusing the ownership of the islands with the administration of the islands. While the ownership of the islands may be disputed by both countries, the administration of the islands is disputed by neither countries. Japan administered the islands and China condemned the administration by Japan. An airspace is automatically controlled by a country who administers an islands. Therefore the airspace is disputed by neither countries.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 07:45, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Can you clarify what you mean by China acknowledging Japanese administration? As far as I know, the PRC side hasn't released any statement acknowledging Japanese administration, just as how Japan officially does not believe that a dispute actually exists (as worded many times by the foreign secretary). News channels such as CCTV use phrases such as "illegal occupation" (非法佔領), and not "administration" to refer to Japanese de facto control over the islands. If you're referring to the supposed 1950s "official government map" which is said to have acknowledged the islands as part of Okinawa Prefecture, the value of the map in question as evidence is up for debate. --  李博杰  &#124; —Talk contribs email 09:05, 8 January 2013 (UTC)

If you don't like the word "administer", I am willing to change it to "control".

"Occupy":
 * To seize possession of and maintain control over by or as if by conquest.
 * to take possession and control of (a place), as by military invasion.
 * to take or hold possession or control of 
 * take control of (a place, especially a country) by military conquest or settlement:
 * to be in control of a place that you have entered in a group using military force

And more "persuasive" Chinese refutation to recent Japanese argument is this semi-official article signed by a scholar not by the Chinese government. Interestingly the article is published in Chinese and Japanese] but not in English. If you would like to add the counter argument, please feel free to add it to Chinese position section.
 * ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 09:46, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Simply put, it's NPOV to say that the airspace is disputed by both parties, however Japan has effective control over that airspace; it is not NPOV to simply call it Japanese airspace, and assume that there is no effective dispute. Not only the actual physical islands are disputed, but so are surrounding waters and the airspace above. China would deny that the airspace is Japanese; Japan however has effective control over the airspace. Hence, it would be factual to say that the disputed airspace is under Japanese control. --  李博杰  &#124; —Talk contribs email 12:07, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
 * If it's an illegal occupation, please provide RS. The Treaty of San Francisco and this agreement say the Senkaku islands belong to Japan. They are valid under the International law. Oda Mari (talk) 09:54, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I'm not saying that it's an illegal occupation. Read what I have written a bit more carefully. I am in pursuit of NPOV on this article, and believe that assuming that the PRC government acknowledges full Japanese administration is problematic. The PRC's position is that Japan's position is illegitimate; whether or not that is true or false is debatable. In other words -- don't ask me to provide a RS; you should make a phone call to Hu Jintao and ask him, Oda Mari. Throwing the Treaty of San Francisco at me isn't going to help with anything, since I'm not making any particular claims on the sovereignty over the islands themselves. --  李博杰  &#124; —Talk contribs email 11:57, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
 * (EC) I reviewed sources; of the first dozen or so that I looked at, the majority (probably about 60%) use the "Japanese airspace"; some qualify it with "alleged" or other similar words. I still think this is just clearly biased, and am willing to explore the issue further if anyone else wants to, (say, for example, at WP:NPOVN), I'm not going to pursue it myself. I don't feel like trying to do numbers on sources just to count which term is more common. I have self-reverted. Qwyrxian (talk) 12:34, 8 January 2013 (UTC)

I don't think the international recognition issue is what makes the Korean situation somewhat different, since in the 1980s neither the Soviet Union nor the PRC recognized the ROK. Had a North Korean aircraft buzzed over a South Korean island at that time, officially Moscow and Beijing wouldn't see an incursion. Most observers, however, would see it as aggressive, given the decades that had passed since the last military engagement, whatever the legal status of the Korean War's settlement. All this to say that references to Chinese incursions should give more of a "not letting sleeping dogs lie" impression than a violation of international law and sovereignty impression, to the extent that an impression has to be given at all. In other words, the reference point should be de facto Japanese possession at the current time as opposed to de jure. Anything that suggests that the way it currently IS is the way it OUGHT to be is presumptively a Japanese POV that should be avoided unless it's made clear to the reader that the Japanese perspective is being adopted. At the same time, I don't think describing an incursion as being into "what Japan considers its airspace" is appropriate, because it assumes an equivalency concerning what currently IS the case that does not exist.--Brian Dell (talk) 02:31, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

Edit request on 15 January 2013
The last section "====Chinese intrusion into Japanese territory====" is not neutral. The islands are disputed; they are not the territory of Japan.

Also, the title should be DiaoYu Islands/Senkaku Islands dispute (not merely Senkaku Islands dispute).

Joeblwh (talk) 22:02, 15 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done:
 * Your first point was discussed above under the subject heading "Airspace incursion". In light of that discussion I'm not inclined to make any edit to that section without consensus.
 * Your second point is much more controversial, and in fact discussions as to the naming of this article were forbidden for almost one year. That restriction, which was placed by the arbitration committee, expired on January 1, 2013, and as far as I can tell (bear in mind that I am not an administrator or arbitration committee member and had no involvement in any of the restrictions placed on this article), there is no active restriction in place on proposing a move of this article. However, I would caution that you will be met with strong opposition if you do make such a proposal. I'd recommend you contact, the administrator who imposed the Arbcom restrictions on this article, if you wish to pursue this matter. Cheers, &mdash; KuyaBriBri Talk 17:16, 16 January 2013 (UTC)

I've adjusted it to "incursions into Japanese-controlled territory". The status quo is Japanese control and the Chinese are challenging that, which suggests Chinese aggression (depending on how established and long-standing the control has been, if the Chinese took it over tomorrow and the Japanese attempted to take it back the day after, it would be more accurate to see the Japanese reaction as part of the same war than a new war started by the Japanese having just lost one started by the Chinese the day before). This doesn't necessarily mean that the Chinese aggression wouldn't be justified. Wikipedia does not need to and should not suggest that there is aggression AND that it is completely unjustified. We just identify the actions and leave it to the rest of the article to outline the various arguments for why the actions may or may not be justified. By taking a minimalist approach Wikipedia can avoid taking a definitive position on the rightness of Japanese control.--Brian Dell (talk) 01:30, 18 January 2013 (UTC)

Protest Photos
There's no international dispute without protests and demonstrations, but how shall we parse them from this article? Taiwan and the Chinese diaspora are also involved, and I don't want to give undue weight. Furthermore the situation is developing, albeit behind closed doors amongst diplomats... kencf0618 (talk) 07:59, 24 January 2013 (UTC)
 * The current image of Japanese demonstration is too small. There are a lot of images at here. I think it should be replaced. Oda Mari (talk) 09:51, 24 January 2013 (UTC)
 * It has since been automagically expanded. kencf0618 (talk) 23:07, 25 January 2013 (UTC)

I replaced the Japanese demonstration image. The reasons are
 * It is unknown that it was staged by Ganbare Nippon from the previous image. The name of Ganbare Nippon/頑張れ日本 can be clearly seen in the new image.
 * The Oct. 2, 2010 demonstration was the most notable demo and reported by major media in the world. But not the 2012 demonstration.
 * The new image is 100% copyright free. Oda Mari (talk) 08:37, 26 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I moved two images to a relevant section. And there is a dedicated article 2012 China anti-Japanese demonstrations, demonstration related images should not be in this article further more. ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 09:01, 26 January 2013 (UTC)
 * I move the Japanese rally image to the right place where the rally is mentioned. Oda Mari (talk) 16:31, 26 January 2013 (UTC)

China and Japan's Wikipedia War
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/02/05/China_Japan_Wikipedia_War_Senkaku_Diaoyu

Does this article get some sort of gold star for this? Hcobb (talk) 18:10, 5 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Probably. I've suggested the article for inclusion in The Signpost (as it's an excellent example of Wikipedia in the media), and furthermore it is in my estimation suitable for inclusion in this article itself!  Self-referential, but hey... kencf0618 (talk) 23:33, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Recentism tag
Every single time a new "event" happens, no matter how trivial, someone seems to add it to the article. Now, I understand—I see the stuff on the news just like everyone else in the region, and it always "feels" like something big is happening ("escalating tensions", "diplomatic consequences", etc.), but the truth is, not all of this week by week history is of lasting encyclopedic value. We do not aim to capture the tiny details of an ongoing event, but, rather, to give a summary overview; after all, that's really the whole point behind having an encyclopedia rather than just a collection of news stories. We provide historical perspective.

Also, from a readability/formatting perspective, we're not supposed to just do chronologies, especially not on bulleted list format.

Now, the problem is, I know that if I were to go in and start deleting stuff, we'd probably start having major fights about what is or is not important. Is there a way we can move forward on fixing this issue? In an ideal article, I don't think we'd have more than a two or three paragraphs per year. We'd summarize things with phrases like "Throughout 2012, there were a number of incidents where Chinese ships entered what Japanese controlled waters.(+refs)" For particularly noteworthy events, like the 2010 boat collision or the 2012 purchase, we'd add some (though not all) of the details.

Would anyone be willing to consider such an approach? Qwyrxian (talk) 10:28, 6 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I agree with Qwyrxian's concern although I frequently added the recent news. I think it is virtually impossible to prevent the edit of the recent event. Another approach is that these recent events except for the important ownership of the islands should be split to another article like The timeline of the disputes on the Senkaku Islands. I am not sure such solution is ultimately good for this article, It is a quite effective solution keeping this article clean.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 10:55, 6 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Speaking as a decided WP:Inclusionist here, I would put in everything now and parse it later ("later" perforce providing context). If diplomacy pours oil on troubled waters, that's one context, whereas downed helicopters and dead men would be another, but in my estimation we're not at the point yet where, say, a separate timeline is called for. Think OODA loop, people; we are still observing, and not quite oriented. kencf0618 (talk) 01:12, 7 February 2013 (UTC)


 * I think what Qwyrxian is trying to say is that we're venturing past what can be considered encyclopedic by including all sorts of minute details reported by the news. Per WP:NOTTEMPORARY, specific content ought to be notable both now and in the future, and some of the things listed might hardly be considered notable, in say, 5, 10 or 20 years time. Creating a separate timeline article doesn't alleviate this problem, as it is merely moving the problematic content somewhere else, and still having it kept on Wikipedia. --  李博杰  &#124; —Talk contribs email 12:31, 6 February 2013 (UTC)
 * You are not responding to Qwyrxian's concern. Do you agree with removing the trivial events from this article? Then, how do you prevent adding trivial events to this article? You cannot prevent editors' desire to edit trivial events. Are you going to delete the addition of the trivial events every time they are added to this article? My proposal is to contain the trash to a dedicated (trash) article to satisfy the editors' wish to edit.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 13:13, 6 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Phoenix, that (deleting trivial events every time added) is exactly what I am proposing. Just because someone "wants" to edit does not mean we oblige them in adding whatever they want. Some people clearly want to add all sorts of things to this article that we won't allow (such as "proof" that one side or the other owns the islands). Belinsquare is correct that moving to a separate article doesn't fix anything, because if you moved it there, I'd still advocate removing trivial events. As to Kencf, my whole point is that, in fact, 99% of these events don't involve "helicopters and dead men". They involve "Politician X said '(much the same thing the last politician said)'" or "Once again, a Chinese vessel entered waters that Japan claims and thus caused both sides to go on yet another media frenzy". I'm not saying these things don't matter...but I kind of am, at least from an "encyclopedic" perspective. I think I may need to make a concrete proposal for a change, but it's a lot of work so I'm hesitant to start if there will only be resistance. Qwyrxian (talk) 01:32, 7 February 2013 (UTC)
 * WP:NOTCRYSTALBALL is most pertinent here, I think. Gather ye data while you may, and winnow it with metadata later. kencf0618 (talk) 01:51, 7 February 2013 (UTC)
 * WP:CRYSTALBALL refers to article content based on future speculation (e.g. Articles for deletion/Windows 7), and not how we uphold our existing policies. --  李博杰  &#124; —Talk contribs email 03:15, 7 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Hurm... Given that the relevancy of the timeline is totally contingent on events, I have upon reflection changed my position.   A timeline of the Senkaku Islands dispute should have its own article (à la 2009 flu pandemic and 2009 flu pandemic timeline); what's in the article now is rather too cumbersome, and it'll only get worse as the sheer number of events accrue. kencf0618 (talk) 22:55, 7 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Kencf0618 wisely created a section 21st century timeline. This section is what we remove or move to a new timeline article. Qwyrxion, how do you curtail this section as you mentioned above? Don't you think it is easier to move the section to a new article as main article and to remove most of the entry from the secton? If you can, please show your ideal edit somewhere in a sandobox. Easier said than done.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 10:53, 8 February 2013 (UTC)
 * August 2012 appears to be the tipping point, namely when widespread protests were orchestrated in the PRC (anti-Japan protests which have an article in their own right). Everything before that is prologue  and necessary historical background, but political decisions were then made which put the issue on the front burner.  The timeline article should have the whole megillah, but how you introduce the historical background in this article is the tricky part.  kencf0618 (talk) 00:12, 9 February 2013 (UTC)
 * P.S. I've created a separate timeline article, and truncated the timeline in this article to the contemporary crisis.  kencf0618 (talk) 00:33, 9 February 2013 (UTC)
 * You removed the most important timeline which describes the ownership of the islands. This discussion is about how "the contemporary crisis" be removed from this article. As I said above, "21st century timeline" section should be moved to a new article and " Historical development" section should remain in this article.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 01:04, 9 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Given that the article itself was begun 2010-10-01, contemporary data are the most relevant. Furthermore, it is in the nature of timelines to include everything, so it is meet that they be given their own sphere.  This article is about the current crisis; that is its focus and raison d'etre.  Consider (by way of analogy, and in a minor key) Roller derby; the History of roller derby has its own article, and for much the same good reason: the contemporary phenomenon is of much more specific encyclopedic contemporary interest than its antecedents, but that said the latter is just a click away.   kencf0618 (talk) 01:52, 9 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Kencf0618, I'd like you to ask you to revert your edit. First, contemproary data is not the most relevant; by that argument, every article on Wikipedia should cover nothing earlier than 2001, the date Wikipedia was first opened. It's just a non sequiter. Further, your claim that this article is about the current crisis is also wrong. This article is about a dispute between 3 "countries" (I don't know what to call Taiwan/China) over who owns some tiny little islands. This dispute began (as we've discussed elsewhere) in 1968. When I was suggesting significantly trimming the timeline section, I didn't mean to just pick an arbitrary time and lop everything else off. What I meant was that we remove the entire timeline (bulleted lists are not appropriate per WP:MOS or, really, good encyclopedic writing, and replace it with prose that significantly summarizes events. Your change has actually made the article worse, because now WP:RECENTISM is even more of a problem then before--the article looks like the month-by month events since 2012 are of vastly more importance than everything than came before it. Please, self-revert, restore the old version, and we can go back to working out how to move forward. Qwyrxian (talk) 07:10, 9 February 2013 (UTC)
 * You are perfectly free to edit as you see fit. I have moved forward already; the extant bulleted timeline was way too cumbersome, so I chopped off the previous decades and centuries. If people want deep background, they can go to the background.  I note also that Foreign Policy published an article about this article's edit wars precisely because of the intense interest in this contemporary, on-going geopolitical event.  Let's not have the deep historical background WP: Coatrack  wag the current crisis dog. kencf0618 (talk) 13:51, 9 February 2013 (UTC)

I have re-added everything from 1968 forward. The problem is very simple: your last sentence above. This article is not, and never has been about the current crisis. It is about the entirety of the dispute between these three nations (with the ancillary involvement of the US) that began in 1968ish. The deep background cannot be a coatrack, because it is what the article has always been. There was never a time, nor should there ever have been a time, when the article was only about the most recent events. In fact, your attempt to transform it into only the "current crisis" is you coat-racking, by changing it from it's broad focus to an unnecessarily and unacceptably narrow one. The goal of this article, as explained in the lead, throughout the body, etc., is to describe the dispute: the reasons, the positions, and the practical consequences. Yes, the section definitely needs to be shorter and summarized, but not cut entirely. Qwyrxian (talk) 15:49, 10 February 2013 (UTC)
 * It's a judgement call. Gotta make the cut somewhere. kencf0618 (talk) 01:25, 11 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Qwyrxian, you removed the most important events without which this dispute cannot be told. Your definition of the beginning of the dispute is too narrow. Without the 1895 incorporation of the islands by Japan, this dispute never happened.
 * As for removing the evnts, you are too idealistic. Seeing the removal of the important events, your edit will not accepted by others. As I said above, if you have a solid idea, please show your edit. A realistic solution is to split the "currnt crisis" to a new article.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 03:03, 11 February 2013 (UTC)
 * We cannot split the current event to a separate article, because there is no such event as Wikipedia would define it. There is no clear starting point that gives more recent events a distinct name and identity from prior events in the dispute. Neither the news nor (as far as I am aware) scholars have reported on something like "The Senkaku Crisis" or "War in the Senkakus" or something like that. Splitting would create an article that violates WP:N. Regarding the events you restored, I disagree, and will start a new section to discuss it. Qwyrxian (talk) 04:13, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

Sangoku Tsu-ran Zusetsu (三国通覧図説)
China and Taiwan are different colors. China and Nyeojin(North China) are different colors, too. Nevertheless, China and Russia are the same color. Great Wall of China is jagged. If Japan give up the dominium of the Senkaku Islands, Alternatively, China would give up dominium over Taiwan, Japan will gladly accept. We should put the whole map as proof of the accusation of China. Sangoku Tsu-ran Zusetsu - Whole map

And, Hayashi Shihei(林子平) is not cartographer. He is just a "thinker". He only wrote the customs of neighboring countries, and he preached about the threat from the sea by the neighboring countries. He doesn't look at anything about dominium. He is the "civilian". He doesn't belong to the government.Wingwrong ★ ʕ•ᴥ•ʔ 04:09, 11 January 2013 (UTC)
 * If you have a link to a more higher resolution image, I can upload the image to Commons. I found several reliable sources.
 * ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 11:11, 11 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Are you serious? Articles from Japanese government websites are considered to be Reliable and Neutral? So I can bring stuffs from Chinese government website? Kezhu2012 (talk) 12:23, 12 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Just a note: Wingwrong has been indefinitely blocked for his actions on Talk:Comfort women. Qwyrxian (talk) 14:28, 11 January 2013 (UTC)
 * Are you serious? Articles from Japanese government websites are considered to be Reliable and Neutral? So I can bring stuffs from Chinese government website? Kezhu2012 (talk) 12:23, 12 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Just a note: Wingwrong has been indefinitely blocked for his actions on Talk:Comfort women. Qwyrxian (talk) 14:28, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Pre-1968 events
In sections above, myself and a number of people have argued, so far with consensus, that the dispute started in 1968 after the finding of oil. We have argued this because, well, that's what the neutral sources say. Phoenix7777, however, has restored events prior to the 1968 date to the "timeline". My argument is that, by definition, those events are not part of the "dispute", since there was no (open) dispute prior to 1968. Now, that information may be useful as background, but it's not a part of the actual dispute, and, as such, needs to be removed from the timeline. Could I hear the position of other editors? Qwyrxian (talk) 04:13, 11 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Seokwoo Lee says, "The significance of subsequent acts and behaviour of the interested parties is dependent upon the determination of the applicable critical date, which is defined as“the date by reference to which a territorial dispute must be deemed to have crystallized”, since the outcome of this dispute will be fundamentally different depending on whether the critical date is January 1895, as claimed by Chinese side, when Japan incorporated Senkaku Islands into Japanese territory, or February 1971 in the case of Taiwan, or December 1971 in the case of China, when Japan made known its official standpoint with the signing of the Okinawa Reversion Treaty, as claimed by Japan." The year1895 is a quite important year to discuss the dispute under the international law. Removing the 1895 event is a censorship of Chinese view. Please note that China never admit there is no dispute before 1968 although it is a consensus of many reliable sources.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 05:17, 11 February 2013 (UTC)
 * In that case we must change the lead to state that it's only the Japanese position that the dispute started in 1968. You can't have it both ways. Qwyrxian (talk) 06:22, 11 February 2013 (UTC)
 * No. After 1968 China began to claim that the dispute was traced back to 1895. However the dispute was never disputed until 1968 as reliable sources say. And the Japan adopted the reliable sources' point of view. So it is not a Japanese POV.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 07:45, 11 February 2013 (UTC)
 * But that stuff is not part of the "dispute" itself. That is background information. And a quick glances says that the majority of it is already covered in prose in the rest of the text. I would like to see all of that re-removed; if any of it is relevant to the dispute, it should be moved elsewhere in the article. The timeline needs to be a timeline of the dispute, not a timeline of the background material. Qwyrxian (talk) 08:13, 11 February 2013 (UTC)
 * As I said above, China claims the dispute began in 1895, then the 1895 event is an event of the dispute. No reason to remove the event from the Timeline. You may be confused the noun "dispute" with the verb "dispute". The "dispute" (noun) may not be "disputed" (verb) at the time of the beginning.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 08:37, 11 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I suggest replacing the title of the sub-section "begginings" with "Background history" and creating a sub-section "Begginings" and describe how and when the dispute begun. Oda Mari (talk) 09:34, 11 February 2013 (UTC)
 * This is why the background material, i.e. the historical background, belongs in a separate omnibus timeline article, and the timeline in this article needed to be truncated. Have the islands been a source of conflict since the Ming Dynasty?  No.  Have they been a source of conflict since the late 20th century, and increasingly so in the early 21st century?  Yes!  The colors on this map and that have certainly changed throughout the centuries, but that constitutes historical background, not the dispute itself, much less the crisis. kencf0618 (talk) 12:37, 11 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I disagree with you. The background history is needed in the article for readers, especially those who do not know much about the dispute, for better understanding. They have to know what happened when before the dispute began in 1971. As for this, I think it should be removed. Lee Seokwoo's analysis sounds a joke to me. If January 1895 was the critical date, why Chinese sides waited until 1971? As there was no protest from others for decades, Japan and the rest of the world took it for granted the validity of the incorporation. See this. I think it's interesting to know China. Oda Mari (talk) 16:22, 11 February 2013 (UTC)
 * First, the question at hand is how much background is needed in the article itself, in timeline format and otherwise. Secondly, Lee's analysis presents several hypotheticals (some more realistic than others) in the terms of framing a solution.  And thirdly, while  UNCLOS is certainly in play, I haven't linked from the acronym because not only was there was more than than one relevant article, the website of the actual UN committee involved hadn't listed China's submission the last time I checked, so what the former Secretary of States had to say isn't really germane within the ambit of Wikipedia.  kencf0618 (talk) 23:42, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

Major change--removal of timeline
Alright, I said I'd do it, and I finally hunkered down and did it today. I presume someone's going to revert me, but before you do, take a minute to hear me out.

First of all, the Manual of Style states, in WP:PROSE, that we should generally prefer running prose to lists. I wholeheartedly agree with this idea. Lists are harder to read, make it easier for people to add every minor detail, and fail to give proper context for the events being described. Now, the prose I've used here is still a bit awkward, since a lot of the sentence start of with something like "In Month, Year...", but I think it's better than before. I decided to group the various incidents together; i.e., rather than a pure chronology, putting the protests together, the fishing boat incidents together, the military encounters together, etc. I think we could probably afford to cut the prose down even more. While I omitted a number of the incidents, it might be reasonable to summarize some of those paragraphs and not least each incident separately.

Second, WP:Splitting states that any article over 100K should almost certainly be split or otherwise trimmed. Articles that size may be difficult for some people to access, especially if they're on either mobile devices or on older equipment or on dial-up.

Third, much of what I did not include is not necessary. If you look at User: Qwyrxian/Temp and User:Qwyrxian/Temp2, you can see the original text. Anything which was struck out was put into the article; all of the non-struck out items were not included. Why? Well, in the case of the 2012 protest info, we don't need to replicate what's already at 2012 China anti-Japanese demonstrations--that's the whole point of using summary style. The same holds true for 2010 Senkaku boat collision incident. Beyond those, though, we really don't need or want much of that text. We don't need to include all of the random speculation (like the Economist claiming China is gearing up for war). Information about new research findings should be incorporated into the arguments section; it's not timeline material. We definitely don't need to know what every random government official from Japan, China, or the U.S. said; where such points are important, they should be covered in the arguments section.

Now, some may argue that all of this material is worth keeping. If so, that may be an argument for reinstating the timeline article. Personally, I don't think so, but I don't know that I'm inclined to argue about it. But what was here before was, well, just not appropriate for an encyclopedia article, and a definite problem in terms of accessibility.

If anyone has a problem with specific things that I've included or left out, let's work on getting those specific points resolved without doing a whole-scale reversion. Of course, if someone thinks that the entire effort is misguided, you can revert, and I'm not going to edit war with you, though I will definitely discuss it and take it through dispute resolution if need be. If you do a whole scale revert, however, you'll need to provide some sort of proposal for getting the argument down below 100K (ideally, down below 80K, but even I didn't accomplish that). Qwyrxian (talk) 05:00, 12 February 2013 (UTC)


 * That's a lot of heavy lifting. Thanks for your hard work! kencf0618 (talk) 07:00, 12 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Kudos to Qwyrxian. Thank you for your effort to improve this article.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 09:02, 12 February 2013 (UTC)

Propose removal of 2 images
I know that we've discussed this before, but I don't recall actually reaching a conclusion; if someone feels that me re-raising this is tendentious, please point to the previous discussions and if necessary I'll withdraw.

I would like to propose that the consul letter and the Renmin Ribao article pictures be removed from the article. Per WP:IMAGE, "Images are primarily meant to inform readers by providing visual information." It is my opinion that these images don't inform the reader of anything. Nothing at all, unless they read Chinese (I assume traditional Chinese, though I'm not sure on the second picture). For readers on en.wiki, that's an unlikely assumption, and one that we should not be making. I believe that explaining them in the text is sufficient. That is, I believe that for 99% of this article (in English; I would probably support their inclusion in Chinese Wikipedia) the images give absolutely no more information than the text does. Further, it's not like this is an article on the Chinese language system, in which images of such text might have a decorative or even educational effect. Here, the documents seem to provide no benefit. Note that this is very very different than the maps, which I fully support keeping. Qwyrxian (talk) 03:56, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Oppose. This article's readers comprise significant number of Chinese people around world. So, I always try to include corresponding Chinese characters as reference. For example:


 * "The 10-page document titled "Draft outline on issues and arguments on parts concerning territories in the peace treaty with Japan"
 * Also, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan includes the two images in its official web site. There is no compelling reason to remove the images.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 04:33, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * This is English Wikiepedia; these articles are not targeted towards Chinese readers. By that argument, we should have a translation of everything here into Chinese, Japanese, and any other vaguely relevant language. But we don't--we have interwiki links. And your point doesn't answer the WP:IMAGE concern. That MofA includes them is great for their purposes, because they're trying to persuade people about something. We're not--we're trying to provide an encyclopedic overview of the debate. And the pictures don't add to that overview. Qwyrxian (talk) 05:01, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Foreign language images are often used to inform readers what a document described in the article looks like. There are numerous foreign language images in the English Wikipedia. If you wish to remove the image in this article, you should discuss elsewhere first, for example Wikipedia talk:Images. Your are challenging the vast amount of articles in the English Wikipedia. You can easily find the foreign language images in other dispute related articles.Paracel Islands, Spratly Islands dispute ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 05:51, 20 February 2013 (UTC)affect
 * Foreign language images are often used to inform readers what a document described in the article looks like. There are numerous foreign language images in the English Wikipedia. If you wish to remove the image in this article, you should discuss elsewhere first, for example Wikipedia talk:Images. Your are challenging the vast amount of articles in the English Wikipedia. You can easily find the foreign language images in other dispute related articles.Paracel Islands, Spratly Islands dispute ―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 05:51, 20 February 2013 (UTC)affect


 * I wouldn't mind removing foreign-language document images from all articles. This is the English Wikipedia, and the content here is catered towards English speakers. Readers come here expecting to be able to read content written in English, and foreign language readers are not our main target demographic. I don't think including these things helps the majority of our readers that much anyway. Hence, I say remove these images, regardless of whether they're written in Chinese, Japanese, Arabic, Serbian, Norwegian or Ossettian, unless the image in question is absolutely necessary (e.g. a image of a stone tablet written in Old Norse, on an article describing the Old Norse language). --  李博杰  &#124; —Talk contribs email 06:24, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Qwyrxian, you are proposing a new controversial guideline, "a foreign language image should not be included in an article in the English Wikipedia." Please gain consensus at a relevant guideline's talk page.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 07:57, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * No, that's not what I'm proposing at all. I'm proposing that we remove an image that literally means nothing (nothing) to a non-Chinese reader. I see those two images there, and they could be advertisements for noodle shops, mathematical treatises, or private romance letters. They have no meaning. They do not help me understand the article in any way. They're not even really decorative. The maps, even though they're not in English, do tell me something useful, because at least I can understand the concept of a map and how it relates to the text. And, actually, when I think about it, I can go even farther in this case: even if those images were in English, they still wouldn't add anything to my understanding. The exact words simply don't matter. Rather, a summary of what is in the letters is what helps me (as a reader) understand. Unless there is something visually important about the images (like they were written in some odd way, or in an odd media), having a picture of words simply isn't helpful. Qwyrxian (talk) 08:56, 20 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Phoenix7777, it appears that you are trying to use a hyperbole to discredit this suggestion. That is not what Qwyrxian proposed, and anyone, including myself, can clearly see that. There are times when images depicting text in a foreign language can be used; other times, it is not suitable. Your average English-speaking reader of the English Wikipedia cannot read East Asian moonrunes, meaning that these images are not helping readers with their understanding of the topic. These images take up space that could instead be used for something that can significantly improve readers' understanding. If I did not understand Chinese or Japanese, and came across this article, I'd be wondering why I'm being shown a bunch of Chinaman chicken-scratches written in a moonspeak that I don't understand. --  李博杰  &#124; —Talk contribs email 09:15, 20 February 2013 (UTC)

Oppose. En:WP is the biggest WP and its readers are not only native en speakers, but a lot of non-en native speakers who learn en as their second language. There are non-Chinese speakers but who can read zh. Please do not underestimate the language skill of readers. There are images in ja used in List of National Treasures of Japan (ancient documents) Are they meaningless? I don't understand Hebrew, but when I see Dead Sea Scrolls, it's meaningful to see what they look like. IMHO, the removal would be welcomed by Chinese claims supporters as the images are very inconvenient for their claims. Oda Mari (talk) 09:40, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Qwyrxian, as I said above, please gain consensus at a relevant guideline's talk page. Whether the image add nothing or not is your personal opinion. The Japanese government included the images because it believes the images are important. Please note there are so many foreign language image in English Wikipedia not limited to a Chinese language.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 10:25, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * No, Phoenix, I won't, because I'm not proposing anything beyond the current guidelines at all. I am stating that these specific images add no explanation whatsoever to my understanding of "The Senkaku Islands dispute". I'm not making an argument about all foreign language media. In fact, Oda Mari has actually given a perfect example of an article that should have foreign language media: Dead Sea Scrolls. That particular article is actually about the document in question, and thus an illustration of the document adds to my understanding of the topic "Dead Sea Scrolls". And, no disrespect to the lot of you who speak more than one language, but the needs or desires of foreign language readers are met by one and only one thing on en.wiki: the interlanguage links. Unless you have a change of heart, I'll start an RfC. Qwyrxian (talk) 10:54, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * You are not responding to the Japanese government included the images to its web site by simply saying "That MofA includes them is great for their purposes, because they're trying to persuade people about something." This article, especially the section "Japanese position" the images are included is the Japanese government's position to this dispute. Why the images are nothing to this article? Also, who determines whether the image is nothing or not? How do you think the images in Paracel Islands and Spratly Islands dispute, are they important than images in this article? Please open Rfc at Wikipedia talk:Images not here. Such a decision affects so many articles. If you do not open Rfc there, I will open Rfc there.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 11:19, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I cannot open an RfC there, because I am not requesting a change in the guidelines. I am asking for outside opinions on how those guidelines should be interpreted with respect to these 2 images on this page. I'll go ahead and start up the RfC right away. Qwyrxian (talk) 11:52, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I understand why you insist to open a Rfc here. You are not confident to persuade other editors here. I said above, I will open a Rfc at Wikipedia talk:Images. There are so many images in Russia, Swedish, Croatian, and others. This discussion is not limited to this article.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 12:14, 20 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Oda Mari, I don't mean to be a huge dick, but are you able to make a point without poisoning the well? There isn't a super secret conspiracy being formulated and that everyone is out to get you. Resorting to full-blown paranoia is quite the nasty tactic. This isn't the first time this has happened. --  李博杰  &#124; —Talk contribs email 17:03, 20 February 2013 (UTC)

RfC on two images
Should the two non-map images currently used in the "Japanese position" section be included in the article? (File:1953renminribao.gif and File:Letter of thanks from ROC consul to Ishigakijima in 1920.jpg) This refers to the image that is a copy of a Chinese Consul in 1920, and the other that is a copy of an article from the Chinese newspaper Renmin Ribao? Do these images meet the guidelines for images as described in WP:IMAGE? Qwyrxian (talk) 12:05, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I opened a Rfc at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Images.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 13:08, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * You go ahead and run that RfC...but that is not what I am asking here. I am asking specifically about these two images on this page in this context. Please do not remove the RfC tags—I will consider you doing so to be deliberate disruption. I am not trying to change Wikipedia policy. I am trying to enforce the pre-existing guidelines on this page, because I feel that those two specific images violate it in this specific context. Qwyrxian (talk) 13:52, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I replied at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Images.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 20:04, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * The duplicate RfC that you created has been closed and discussion has been redirected here. Please do not do this again as forum shopping such as this will be considered a violation of the sanctions at the top of the page. ··· 日本穣 ? · 投稿  · Talk to Nihonjoe ·  Join WP Japan ! 20:42, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Nihonjoe. You misunderstand the situation. We were discussing which Rfc should be openeed. During the discussion, Qwyrxian unilaterally opened the Rfc without consensus. Please see above discussion. Qwyrxian is asking "Do these images meet the guidelines for images as described in WP:IMAGE" in this Rfc. Why shouldn't such a Rfc be at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Images?―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 21:09, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Your argument that "Qwyrxian unilaterally opened [this] Rfc without consensus" is irrelevant as anyone can open an RfC at any time without getting prior consensus to do so. Perhaps this RfC should be moved there instead of here, but opening another RfC there and telling Qwyrxian he needs to close this one is forum shopping and ultimately confusin as people won't know where they need to post their opinions on the issue. As this RfC is specifically about how the image policy should be applied here in this article in this instance, this is just as valid a location for the discussion as anywhere else. That's the whole point of the RfC system: it lists them in a centralized location so people can easily find them regardless of where the discussion is being held. ··· 日本穣 ? · 投稿  · Talk to Nihonjoe ·  Join WP Japan ! 22:08, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * I opened a Rfc at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Images and removed a Rfc tag of this Rfc immediately in order to avoid duplicated Rfcs. However, Qwryxian reverted the edit and made these Rfcs duplicated.
 * This Rfc is asking the interpretation of WP:IMAGE as Qwyrxian said above. His argument is whether the images violate WP:IMAGE "Images are primarily meant to inform readers by providing visual information." The best place to discuss this Rfc should be Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Images.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 22:33, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Phoenix, you misunderstand how RfC's work. By your logic, the RfC we held last year on the name of these articles should have been held at WT:Article titles. Or every RfC on using sources would be held at WT:RS. An RfC on the talk page for a guideline would be an RfC seeking a change to that guideline, or maybe trying to look for clarification on how the policy applies across the site. But I'm not asking that, nor do I think we should be asking that. I'm asking about 2 images on this article. Qwyrxian (talk) 23:27, 20 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Then who are you going to request for a comment? This Rfc is categorized as "History and geography" and "Politics, government, and law". You have not even notified to WP:IMAGE.―― Phoenix7777 (talk) 08:36, 21 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Hes asking about two images and there value here - Image use policy has no bearing on the value of images at individual articles - hes not asking to change any policy - hes asking for assistance from those familiar with history, geography, politics, government, and law - those people that deal with content in articles - not policy.22:07, 21 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Remove - I see no value in the images here for our readers of English Wikipedia. They do not convey any tangible information for our reader's. Moxy (talk) 05:34, 21 February 2013 (UTC)
 * There's no rule against displaying non-English documents; you can see examples of two (one in Japanese and another in both Arabic and English) at High school diploma. But I don't think these are really adding information.  Why not leave them out, but add a link to commons:Category:Senkaku Islands for anyone who wants to see other images?  WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:38, 22 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Remove as there is no functional difference between these images and a mass of Japanese text in the article body itself. To User:WhatamIdoing's point, the images of the diplomas are interesting because they demonstrate the form of various diplomas rather than focusing on the content. That can't be said for these images. Regards, Orange Suede Sofa  (talk) 01:47, 22 February 2013 (UTC)
 * Comment @WhatamIdoing: I do absolutely agree with adding a link to the commons category; in fact, I don't think there's anything contentious about that at all, and even if the RfC ended with the pics being kept, I don't think a link hurts. Qwyrxian (talk) 04:10, 22 February 2013 (UTC)


 * Remove I don't feel that they are vital enough to the article. A link to Wikicommons would be a cleaner, better option. Dreambeaver  (talk) 21:32, 4 March 2013 (UTC)

China's Straight Baseline Claim
There's no mention of China's more recent straight baseline claim.

Has it's inclusion been discussed on these pages? --Iyo-farm (talk) 04:38, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

POV section
I've removed this section as I feel it contains too strongly an interpretative POV. The originals do not include the word "objected" nor being "warned by China".

''Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1884. In that year, the Japanese Minister of Foreign Affairs objected to the annexation of those islands by stating that those islands were "near to the Qing's (China's) border", "had Chinese names", and Japanese activity "in the offshore's coast of Qing Dynasty had already raised the attention of Chinese newspapers and were warned by China". Following this advice, the Japanese interior minister, Yamagata Aritomo, turned down the request for incorporating those islands into Japanese territory. The Chinese governments see it as evidence to disprove the Japanese claim that those islands were terra nullius when they decided to incorporate them in 1895.''

The Japanese government kept postponing the issue and it was only in 1895, when ... I also consider that the original authors may misunderstand the mean of the term terra nullius or are perhaps confusing it was res nullius? The original correspondence also states that surveys proved no particular trace of having been under the control of the Qing Dynasty which is omitted.

I found the original quote on the MOFA website which records it as: [Reference 1: A letter dated October 21, 1885, sent by Foreign Minister Inoue to Interior Minister Yamagata]


 * Concerning the aforementioned islands (note: Senkaku Islands), they are in proximity to the national border with the Qing Dynasty, their circumferences appear smaller than those of the Daito Islands after our on-site survey and in particular, their names are being attached by the Qing Dynasty. There are rumors recently circulated by Qing newspapers and others, including one that say our government is going to occupy the islands in the vicinity of Taiwan that belong to the Qing Dynasty, which are arousing their suspicions towards our country and frequently alerting the Qing government for caution. If we took measures such as publicly erecting national markers, it would result in making the Qing Dynasty suspicious. Therefore, we should have the islands surveyed and details ? such as the configuration of harbors and the prospect of land development and local production ? reported and stop there. We should deal with the erection of national markers, land development and other undertakings some other day."

[Reference: A letter dated October 9, 1885, by Interior Minister Yamagata to Foreign Minister Inoue]


 * "... Draft report to the Grand Council of State Concerning investigation into the uninhabited Kumeakashima and two other islands dotted between Okinawa Prefecture and Fuzhou of the Qing Dynasty, the prefectural governor submitted a report as per the document attached (note: a report submitted by the governor of Okinawa to Interior Minister Yamagata on September 22, 1885, Appendix 2). The aforementioned islands appear to be identical with the islands reported in the Records of Messages from Chong-shan, but they were mentioned as a mere direction in the course of voyage and showed no particular trace of having been under the control of the Qing Dynasty while the islands' names were different between them and us. They belong to the uninhabited islands near Miyako, Yaeyama and others under the control of Okinawa and, therefore, there should be no problem with the prefecture surveying them and erecting national markers on them."..

Perhaps there are better more academic sources discussing it meaning than the ones which were being used? --Iyo-farm (talk) 05:41, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

China Marine Surveillance
There's content on this issue at China Marine Surveillance. I've linked both articles, but as an uninvolved editor, would like the content to be considered in the context of this topic and so list here for a heads-up. Widefox ; talk 11:25, 4 June 2013 (UTC)

Change of Article Title
The title should (or I will say MUST) be changed to either Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands dispute or Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands dispute to avoid siding
 * I see your point, but we typically use only one name for a territorial dispute, and that name is the name of the article of the territory in dispute. In this case, the name of the relevant article is Senkaku Islands. Another example is Falkland Islands sovereignty dispute (where the "other name" of those islands is Islas Malvinas). Regards, Orange Suede Sofa  (talk) 17:52, 6 June 2013 (UTC)

David Chan Yuk-cheung
I've linked a few more articles, and included the 1996 incident involving David Chan Yuk-cheung. This needs a source. I invite others to participate in Articles_for_deletion/David_Chan_Yuk-cheung. Widefox ; talk 16:12, 16 June 2013 (UTC)

1786年中国往琉球海路图 Sangoku Tsūran Zusetsu Map description is purposely misleading (Source provided)
First, the picture is cropped in a way to be as misleading as possible; the map is designed to show Japanese sovereignty. Here is a link to the entire map: http://www2.lib.hokudai.ac.jp/hoppodb/contents/map/l/0D000590000000000.jpg (note the map faces East) The blurb says that the map has the Senkaku Island painted red, the same color as China in an attempt to mislead the reader into thinking that it is Japanese acknowledgement of Chinese sovereignty. However the map has in red all territories that Japan didn't rule over, including the Ishigaki Islands in red in that cropped picture, even those far East of it - these same islands that China never ruled and still doesn't contest. Furthermore it even has Taiwan in yellow and consider this map was made in 1786 so it would be even less likely plausible for them. This is a key fact that can be seen with quick observation. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Shrimpcrackers (talk • contribs) 05:01, 23 October 2013 (UTC)