Chinese mobs spark crisis meeting

SHANGHAI - A top Japanese minister arrived in Beijing last night to protest against violent anti-Japan demonstrations as relations between the two Asian powerhouses reached their lowest point in decades.

Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura is expected to accuse China of failing to protect Japanese property from damage by protesters when he holds crisis talks with his Chinese counterpart, Li Zhaoxing, today.

Machimura said he would renew demands for an apology and compensation for damages caused to Japanese property, the BBC reported.

The Chinese are furious at a revised Japanese school textbook they say whitewashes atrocities during Japan's 1931-45 occupation of China and at Tokyo's bid for a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council.

In the third weekend of violent protests, thousands marched to Japan's consulate in Shanghai, smashing windows with rocks and pelting it with paint bombs and attacking Japanese restaurants along the way.

China's official Xinhua news agency put the number of protesters in Shanghai at 20,000.

"It was a result of Japan's wrong attitudes and actions on a series of issues concerning China," it quoted Shanghai municipal government spokeswoman Jiao Yang as saying.

Some protesters held posters carrying messages such as "Face up to history" and "The anti-Japan war is not over yet".

Two Japanese people were injured when they were surrounded by a group in Shanghai, where thousands of Japanese firms and about 34,000 Japanese expatriates are located, Japanese media reported.

Jiao repeated the call for people to "remain calm and rational, express their aspirations in a lawful and orderly manner, and turn their patriotism into an impetus in their work and study but not to join any unapproved activities".

Local media said some protesters had been detained for threatening public order.

As many as 2000 people marched through the streets of the northeastern Chinese city of Shenyang, Japan's Kyodo news agency said. Demonstrators hurled bottles and eggs at the Japanese consulate in the city, the capital of once Japanese-occupied Manchuria. In Beijing, hundreds of paramilitary police guarded the ambassador's residence or waited to take up positions for the second straight day.

Demonstrators last weekend threw rocks and bottles at the compound, but there has been no further protests in the capital.

Several hundred people protested in southern Dongguan and southwestern Chengdu on Sunday.

Kyodo said 2000 Chinese workers protested at a Japanese-run factory in southern Guangdong province and 200 people protested in southern Shenzhen. Several thousand marched in Hong Kong.

The violence has raised concerns about a backlash in Japan, and police have tightened security at Chinese facilities.

- REUTERS