China asks Japan for help with earthquake relief

TOKYO — China has asked Japanese soldiers to deliver earthquake relief aid in what would be the first significant military dispatch between the two countries since World War II, officials said Wednesday.

It would involve Japanese defense forces airlifting tents and other relief supplies to quake-hit areas in central China, defense and foreign ministry officials said.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura said Japan is considering using a military plane and surplus tents and blankets.

"Our understanding is that the request is to fly a plane belonging to the Self Defense Forces to deliver its tents and blankets to a Chinese airport," he said. "A decision shouldn't take too long, and we are working on it now."

Earlier, a Foreign Ministry official in charge of China affairs said officials were considering whether to use Self-Defense Forces aircraft or civilian chartered planes. The official spoke on condition of anonymity, citing protocol.

Japan invaded China and set up a puppet regime in Manchuria in 1932, then conquered larger areas of the country before being defeated by the Allies in 1945. Many Chinese still resent Japan for its military aggression at that time.

Since the war, Japan has sent only a small group of defense experts to China to dispose of chemical weapons abandoned by Japanese troops.

Though postwar relations between China and Japan have been rocky, the two countries have grown closer in the past 18 months. Japan was the first foreign nation that China turned to for help after the May 12 quake.

Tokyo sent a 60-member civilian emergency rescue team days after the quake struck China's Sichuan province, followed by a medical team last week.

"As a neighbor, we are willing to do anything that would help them, and do as much as we can," Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura told reporters later Wednesday.

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