Chinese Employee Says ‘Senkakus are China’s Territory’ During Japan’s Public NHK Radio Broadcast

The Yomiuri Shimbun

13:59 JST, August 20, 2024

A Chinese contracted employee made remarks that the Senkaku Islands are China’s territory during a Chinese-language news report on NHK’s international radio program, the public broadcaster announced Monday.

NHK lodged a protest with the employee, a man in his 40s, through the organization that has a contract with him, claiming that the content was inappropriate and unrelated to the news. The outside organization said it intends to terminate its contract with the man in question.The statements were made during a live Chinese-language news broadcast that aired from around 1 p.m. on the NHK World-Japan and Radio 2 channels. After reporting the news that someone had scribbled graffiti on a stone pillar at Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo, the employee made unscripted remarks for about 20 seconds, saying that the Senkaku Islands are China’s territory. The Japanese government has stated that the islands in Okinawa Prefecture are inherent to Japan and there is no territorial issue over them.

The employee had been translating news scripts into Chinese and reading them on the radio since 2002. NHK had not confirmed his intentions of making the remarks, and the employee had reportedly said he would be communicating through his representative in the future.

On Monday evening, NHK issued an apology saying, “It was inappropriate that remarks unrelated to a news topic were broadcast, and we deeply apologize for that.” NHK also said that it will consider measures such as pre-recording programs.