Thousands of Chinese smashed windows and threw rocks at the Japanese embassy and ambassador's residence in Beijing today in a protest against Japan's wartime past and bid for a seat on the UN Security Council.
Protesters pushed their way through a paramilitary police cordon to the gates of the residence of the Japanese ambassador, throwing rocks and water bottles and shouting "Japanese pig come out".
Chinese protestors hurl eggs at the the Japanese embassy in Beijing today.
Some 500 paramilitary police holding plastic shields raced into the compound and barricaded the gates, a witness said. Protesters threw stones and bricks at the residence, and shouted at police, "Chinese people shouldn't protect Japanese."
Demonstrators, who said they had been organised mostly through e-mail and instant messaging, had been marching peacefully under heavy police guard at various places in the capital.
One group began throwing bottles and stones when they passed a Japanese restaurant, smashing windows with tiles they had ripped from its roof before police stopped them. Protesters also attacked a Bank of Tokyo Mitsubishi branch and smashed windows before police moved in.
Another group outside the embassy in southeast Beijing threw stones and plastic water bottles, smashing windows in the compound, a Reuters photographer said. Some demonstrators scuffled with police.
But by late afternoon most of the crowd at the embassy had dispersed, persuaded by police to board waiting buses to take them home. Anti-Japanese sentiment has been running high in China since Japan on Tuesday approved a school textbook critics say whitewashes atrocities committed during World War II, and many Chinese feel the country has not owned up to its wartime aggression.
The demonstration started in the Beijing neighbourhood of Zhongguancun, known for its electronics shops and home to a large student population, and comes less than a week after anti-Japanese protests in other Chinese cities turned violent. "Japan doesn't face up to its history," said Cheng Lei, a 27-year-old information technology professional.
"We want to express our feelings so the Japanese government knows what we think." Police declined to say how many protesters were on the streets, but the official Xinhua news agency put the number at more than 10,000.
Agencies