Japan starts pushing China on trade and currency

FT story on how Japan getting testy in China's direction over rise of yen and growing Chinese purchases of Japanese debt--sound familiar?

Japan's finance minister, speaking in the parliament, complains that it's a one-way street:  Japan cannot buy Chinese currency or debt.  Meanwhile, China's yen purchases this year are 6x larger than the previous five years put together.

All this while the latest maritime spat plays itself out.

Japan's Democratic Party won power for several reasons, to include their promise to work for a "relationship of trust" with China.

No one, for now, predicting a decline in relationships similar to 2005, because the economic bonds have grown spectacularly since then.  But something to watch:  in May China promised to restart talks on bilat exploitation of gas in East China Sea.  Does that go away now?

South Koreans are now bitching about the same things.

So we see continue to see natural regional resistance to China's rise, which is less a choice on China's part and more of a negotiation on everybody's part. Beijing seems to be losing track of the latter reality.

But that will change.