Special to WorldTribune.com

China has detained four Japanese nationals, one a defector from North Korea, on charges of spying for the Japan government.

Tokyo has vehemently denied the charges which threaten to undermine the recent cooling of tensions between China and Japan that has included discussions on a summit between Chinese President Xi Jinping and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

The Chinese government announced on Oct. 11 that in June it had detained on espionage charges a Japanese woman in her 50s in Shanghai and a Japanese man in his 60s in Beijing.

Earlierl, China announced on Sept. 30 that it had arrested two Japanese nationals in separate cases in Liaoning and Zhejiang provinces. Both men, aged 51 and 55, work in the private sector in Japan.

Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga denied the two men were spying on behalf of Tokyo.

“Our country has never done such a thing,” he said at a press conference at which he called on China to release the detainees immediately.

A source had told Japan’s Kyodo News that the two men, one a defector from North Korea, were collecting information about Chinese military activities for Japan’s Public Security Agency.

Jun Okumura, a visiting scholar at the Meiji Institute for Global Affairs, says China’s allegations of espionage against the four Japan nationals are difficult to fathom.

“From the media reports, I understand that one of the men arrested earlier was taking photos of Chinese military aircraft and airfields, but that sounds more like curiosity than spying to me,” Okumura said. “What sort of intelligence could be gained by standing outside an airfield fence? There are far better ways of collecting useful information — satellite images, electronic eavesdropping, signals intelligence — than a camera through a fence.”

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