Key facts
- The Yomiuri report said Masaaki Kanai conveyed a message from Takaichi to Liu Jinsong in Beijing on November 18, 2025.
- The reported mission failed to ease the diplomatic rupture between Beijing and Tokyo.
- Takaichi's November 7, 2025 remarks were the first by a sitting prime minister detailing a specific Taiwan crisis response, the Japan Times reported.
- Beijing has kept pressure on Japan across economic, diplomatic and security spheres since the remark, the Nikkei reported, according to Sedaily.
Japan's foreign ministry official Masaaki Kanai met his Chinese counterpart Liu Jinsong, then head of Asian affairs, in Beijing on November 18, 2025, the Yomiuri newspaper reported on November 8, 2026. Kanai was conveying a message from Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, according to the report, which said the diplomatic mission failed.
The rupture followed Takaichi's remarks in parliament on November 7, 2025 that a Chinese naval blockade of Taiwan could constitute a survival-threatening situation for Japan and warrant the use of collective self-defense. The Japan Times reported that the comments were the first by a sitting prime minister to detail a specific case of how Tokyo might respond to a Taiwan Strait crisis.
Beijing has kept up pressure on Japan across economic, diplomatic and security spheres since the remark, the Nikkei reported, according to Sedaily. China claims Taiwan as its own and has vowed to bring the island under its control, by force if necessary, the Japan Times reported.