Tokyo: More than 80 percent of Japanese feel no friendship towards China, a new survey has found.
According to the annual survey by the Cabinet Office, some 80.6 percent of respondents said they have no friendly feelings towards China, which is a rise of 9.2 points from the previous year and the highest level on record since the survey was conducted in 1978.
The previous record of 77.8 percent who expressed anti-Chinese sentiment was set in 2010, after a Chinese trawler rammed two coast guard cutters trying to shoo it out of Japanese territorial waters off the disputed Senkaku Islands, or Diaoyu as they are called by Beijing, the Japan Times reports.
Meanwhile, the number of respondents who voiced friendly feelings towards China slumped 8.3 points to just 18 percent, according to the Cabinet Office.
According to the report, the findings reflect the heightened tensions between the two countries following Japan`s nationalisation of three of the five Senkaku islands, whose sovereignty is fiercely contested by Beijing, in the East China Sea, a Foreign Ministry official noted.
The survey also showed that 92.8 percent respondents did not feel bilateral relations with China is proceeding smoothly.
Only 4.8 percent felt the Sino-Japanese relationship is in a healthy state, a year-on-year plunge of some 14 points.
Meanwhile, the poll also revealed that 59 percent of respondents do not view South Korea in a friendly manner, a steep jump of 23.7 points from last year.
The poll found that those who voiced positive sentiment plummeted 23 points to 39.2 percent, dropping below 40 percent for the first time in 15 years, the report said.
ANI
