Beijing holds fire after Shinzo Abe's controversial visit to war shrine
For now, China may only condemn Japanese PM and step up patrols around disputed islands
Beijing will refrain from taking any concrete response to Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's visit to a controversial war shrine as the central government assesses the impact on Tokyo's relationship with its neighbours and Washington.
Buoyed by the US government's strong criticism of Abe's visit, President Xi Jinping's administration is unlikely to do much more than condemn the move and step up patrols around the Diaoyu Islands, or Senkaku Islands as Japan calls them, which are claimed by both China and Japan.
The US embassy in Tokyo on Thursday expressed "disappointment" over the trip to the Yasukuni Shrine, which honours 2.5 million Japanese war dead, including 14 top-level war criminals. It said the visit would "exacerbate tensions".
Zhang Baohui , a security specialist at Lingnan University, said that while the alliance between Washington and Tokyo would probably remain strong, China would attempt to exploit any divisions between the two.
"China will not appear to be provocative so as to avoid forcing the US into giving strong backing to Tokyo," he said.
