2016.06.02

（短評）フィリピンのドゥテルテ新政権にとっての南シナ海問題

　フィリピンではドゥテルテ新政権が６月３０日に発足するのを控えて、南シナ海問題をめぐり中国や米国との関係がどうなるか、関心が集まっている。
　５月３１日、ドゥテルテが「長年の同盟国である米国に依存することはない」と述べると、「中国や南シナ海をめぐる問題への対応で米国からの自立を一段と図る姿勢を示した」と報道された（同日、ロイター電）。
　ドゥテルテが対米依存に批判的なことはかねてから知られており、今回の発言も特に目新しいものではないが、新政権の対外姿勢全般にかかわることであり、このように報道されるのは自然なことだ。

　一方、中国はドゥテルテに期待感を抱いている。ドゥテルテの祖先に中国人がいることも一つの要因かもしれない。
　ともかく、習近平主席が５月３０日に送った祝電には次の言葉が含まれていた。
　「中国とフィリピンは友好交流の歴史が長く、両国民は伝統的な厚い友情を築いてきた。友好、安定、健全に発展する中比関係は両国と両国民の根本的利益に合致する。中比の近隣友好関係と互恵協力を維持・深化することが両国指導者の共同の責任だ。両国が共に努力し、中比関係を健全な発展の軌道に戻したい。」

　しかし、フィリピンの米国からの自立は進むか。ことは簡単でない。ドゥテルテは国内向けには威勢のよい発言をしているが、中国に対しては、国際法の下で沿岸国に認められた２００カイリの排他的経済水域（ＥＥＺ）を尊重するよう求めている。
　また、南シナ海問題の解決のため、領有権を主張する国々だけでなく、米国や日本、オーストラリアを含めた多国間協議を支持しており、これは中国が嫌うことだ。
　今回の記者説明の際に、中国との二国間協議を求めるのかと質問されたのに対し、「われわれが独自の進路を決めるということを皆に知ってもらいたい。米国に依存することはない。フィリピン人以外の人々を満足させようとはしない」などと述べている。これは微妙な発言であり、とりあえず一般論で交わしたとも解される。
　アキノ大統領はスカーボロー礁での紛争をめぐって、米国に依存しつつ中国に対抗してきた。フィリピンの艦艇はそこから引き揚げ、中国船は居座ったままであるが、フィリピン領だと主張している。
　ドゥテルテはアキノ大統領に批判的で、同礁は「中国にとられた」と批判してきた。
　スカーボロー礁はマニラから３００キロもない距離にあり、中国がここで南沙諸島でのように埋め立て工事などを始めるとフィリピンにとっては大問題になる。そうなるとドゥテルテとしても対米依存から脱却という感情論だけでは済まない現実に直面することになる。
　また、国際仲裁裁判の結論はドゥテルテ政権が成立した後に公表される公算が大きいが、それが同政権の本当の姿勢を問う最初の試金石になりそうだ。

2016.05.25

President Obama should visit Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum

President Obama should visit Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum by all means. The schedule of President is not yet announced, while the Museum is closed on the afternoon of May 27, the day of Presidential visit to Hiroshima.
The Museums of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are the only places where the visitors can time trip back to the nuclear explosion of seventy-one years ago and can feel its real nature. Nothing else is equally important.

2016.05.21

President Obama’s visit to Hiroshima

One reason why the nuclear weapons are not abolished is they are needed in the actual international politics as deterrent, but the real reason is that people do not have true understanding about the inhumanity of nuclear weapons.
Weapons are inhumane by nature but some of them cause extraordinary consequences so that movements to prohibit these weapons were begun from the end of 19th century. The United Nations further developed and elaborated the concept of inhumanity, and created treaties to ban use of inhumane weapons.
As a result, ‘excessive’ and ‘indiscriminate’ are identified as factors to characterize the inhumane nature of weapons.
The nuclear weapons injure and kill a vast amount of civilians, in addition to the problems that they are excessively injurious and cause indiscriminate effects.
However there is no treaty to ban the use of nuclear weapons whereas other inhumane weapons such as poison gas and anti-personnel mines are banned by treaties.
Nuclear disarmament and prohibition of nuclear weapons are now under debate in the framework of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) and the United Nations, but reaching agreement on the use of nuclear weapons seems as difficult as their entire abolition. Disagreement between the nuclear weapon states and non nuclear weapon states is so deep.
Under such circumstances, international movements to establish the concept of inhumanity were launched from a few years ago. It was preceded by the advisory opinion on the Legality of the Threat or Use of Nuclear Weapons by the International Court of Justice which was handed down in 1996. It said that the use of nuclear weapons was in principle against the international humanitarian law, but this was just an “advisory opinion“ that had no legally binding force on states.
A newly launched movement aims to create political consensus by countries on the inhumanity of nuclear weapons.
Even in this movement, however, consensus on the inhumanity of nuclear weapons is not achieved yet because the deterrence theory has a strong influence there too.
Japanese government is recommending world leaders to visit Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and directly feel how inhumane the nuclear weapons and their consequences are. Visit to the cities enables people to understand inhumanity of nuclear weapons through direct “experience”, while global movements described above is to achieve the goal by words. The G7 meeting held at Hiroshima this April was greatly effective to let them feel the inhumanity of nuclear weapons.
What is particularly important here was that feeling the inhumanity of nuclear weapons by direct experience was so different from understanding by words. United States Secretary State John Kerry frankly confessed that he was surprised.
I was the Ambassador of Delegation of Japan to the Conference on Disarmament, and had chances to visit with Western people the memorial museums in Hiroshima and in Nagasaki. I remember so well that they were astonished by what they had seen and felt there because it was quite different from what they had known before.
Actually people’s understanding of the inhumanity of nuclear weapons is not deep enough even though they think they know it intellectually. If they really understand they may become more serious about nuclear disarmament. If they understand the cruelty of nuclear weapons not only by words but also by experience, they can be different. Therefore, it is absolutely necessary for us to correctly understand the real situation of nuclear bombing.
President Obama decided to visit Hiroshima overcoming lots of negative opinions against the visit. Some people were worried that the president would be required to apologize. But that should not happen obviously. President Obama’s decision is of great importance beyond description for nuclear disarmament, and for the US-Japan relationship, and even for world peace.
Hoping the US president will visit Nagasaki too in the near future, I wish the presidential visit to Hiroshima will be completed without difficulty.
(長江隆氏の協力によりTHEPAGEへの寄稿文を英訳）