By Guan Zhaoyu

China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced on March 30 that it has imposed countermeasures on Furuya Keiji, a member of the House of Representatives of the National Diet of Japan, including freezing his assets in China, prohibiting transactions and cooperation, denying visas, and barring entry. It noted that Furuya has repeatedly made provocative visits to Taiwan and colluded with "Taiwan independence" separatist forces, seriously violating the one-China principle and the guiding principles of the four political documents between China and Japan, and severely undermining China's sovereignty and territorial integrity.

The reason why Furuya was singled out for countermeasures by the Chinese side is by no means due to "occasional improper" remarks or actions on his part, but because he stands at the forefront of Japan's political forces provoking on the Taiwan question. Furuya Keiji has long been active on the front line of Japan's conservative camp in political maneuvering on the Taiwan question, repeatedly making provocative visits to Taiwan and colluding with the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) authorities. In March this year, he once again visited Taiwan to attend the so-called "Yushan Forum", where he openly clamored that "Japan is determined to protect Taiwan, Taiwan's democracy, and peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait." He even put forward the dangerous notion of the so-called "trilateral exchanges" among Japan's right-wing forces, the DPP authorities in Taiwan, and relevant forces in the United States. China's State Council Taiwan Affairs Office subsequently criticized him by name, pointing out that his remarks were intended to embolden "Taiwan independence" separatist forces and constitute an open provocation against the one-China principle. In other words, Furuya is not an ordinary "pro-Taiwan lawmaker" in Japan, but one of the active operators through which Japan's right-wing forces conduct strategic probing on the Taiwan question.

However, if the issue is understood merely as Furuya Keiji's personal misconduct, it would underestimate the seriousness of the current situation. Behind Furuya lies an increasingly explicit "using Taiwan to contain China" approach pursued by Japan's right-wing forces in recent years. Domestically, they package the notion of "Taiwan emergency" as a national security issue to justify constitutional revision, military buildup, and the deregulation of defense constraints. Externally, they use the Taiwan question to demonstrate to the United States its strategic value as a "forward pivot" in the Indo-Pacific, thereby further embedding itself into the framework of the US-Japan alliance's strategic competition with China.

After Sanae Takaichi assumed office as Japan's prime minister, the risks inherent in this approach have become even more pronounced. In November 2025, Takaichi publicly claimed that a Taiwan emergency could constitute a "survival-threatening situation" under which Japan may exercise the right of collective self-defense, and subsequently made clear that she had no intention of retracting the remarks. On the surface, this may appear to be merely a Diet response. In essence, it reflects ongoing efforts at the legal and policy levels to bind the Taiwan question to Japan's military intervention capabilities, gradually repackaging China's internal affair into a legitimate issue within Japan's domestic security policy. Furuya Keiji has frequently made provocative visits to Taiwan and clamored for "protecting Taiwan", while the Takaichi administration has, from the rear, continued to amplify the erroneous narrative that "a Taiwan emergency is a Japan emergency," forming a coordinated front-and-back alignment. The former undertakes boundary-testing and strategic probing, while the latter provides rhetorical amplification and policy follow-through, ultimately serving Japan's right-wing forces' long-term objective of leveraging the Taiwan Strait situation to break through post-war constraints and accelerate the militarization of its security role.

It is worth noting with vigilance that Japan's right-wing adventurism on the Taiwan question is no longer confined to rhetoric by politicians, but is beginning to spill over into the real security domain. On March 24, an active-duty officer of the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force (JGSDF) scaled the wall and intruded into the Chinese Embassy in Japan. Viewed in isolation, this already constitutes a serious breach of diplomatic premises security. However, in light of the political context, it must not be downplayed as an isolated "individual extremist act". When Japan's political arena treats a "tough stance on China" as a key bargaining chip in right-wing competition, when the narrative that "a Taiwan emergency is a Japan emergency" is repeatedly propagated, and when provocations on the Taiwan question are packaged as so-called value-based commitments, extremist sentiments are highly likely to spill over from the parliament and the media into society at large, and even erode security systems that should be under strict control.

When Furuya Keiji's provocative visits to Taiwan, the Takaichi administration's adventurist remarks on the Taiwan question, and the intrusion by a Self-Defense Force officer into the Chinese Embassy are viewed together, the risks inherent in Japan's right-wing approach to the Taiwan question become even more evident. It is no longer merely a case of a few right-wing politicians exploiting the issue, but a chain of political operations gradually taking shape in which different elements reinforce and support one another.

The Taiwan question is one of the most sensitive and fragile security issues in East Asia. The more frequently external forces send erroneous signals to "Taiwan independence" separatist forces, the more likely they are to encourage miscalculation and heighten the risk of the situation in the Taiwan Strait spiraling out of control. Taiwan's restoration to China is an important outcome of the victory of World War II and the post-war international order. As a defeated country in WWII, Japan should be a recipient and adherent of the post-war order, rather than a disruptor that seeks to exploit the Taiwan question to probe and loosen the boundaries of that order. The more Japan's right-wing forces press ahead adventurously on the Taiwan question, the more it reveals their lingering unwillingness to accept post-war constraints, and exposes their underlying attempt to leverage regional tensions to advance a trajectory of "political rightward shift, military deregulation, and national repositioning".

The Taiwan question is at the core of China's core interests and a red line that must not be crossed. Any acts that use the Taiwan question to undermine China's sovereignty and territorial integrity or to erode the political foundation of China-Japan relations, regardless of the pretext, will incur a heavy price.

(The author is an expert on East Asian affairs from China Youth University of Political Studies)

Editor's note: Originally published on china.com.cn, this article is translated from Chinese into English and edited by the China Military Online. The information and opinions in this article do not necessarily reflect the views of eng.chinamil.com.cn.