<
https://www.newsguardrealitycheck.com/p/chinese-sources-push-territorial?r=60itk4>
"
What happened: Pro-China sources are spreading manipulated videos
purportedly showing residents of the Japanese Ryukyu Islands saying they’re
Chinese, not Japanese, in an apparent effort to bolster Beijing’s territorial
claims over the islands amid rising tensions between China and Japan.
Context: Although the Ryukyu Islands, including Okinawa, have been part of
Japan since 1879, Beijing has repeatedly claimed that the islands are Chinese
and should be considered part of China,
The Washington Post reported.
A closer look: Chinese accounts are sharing videos of Japanese influencers
speaking about lifestyle topics in Japanese, adding false translations to make
it appear that the videos feature Ryukyu Island residents saying that they
consider themselves to be Chinese.
NewsGuard found 114 of these videos across multiple platforms that depict
Japanese influencers. These videos were miscaptioned in Mandarin to advance
pro-China territorial claims, which were falsely attributed to Ryukyu Islands
residents, amassing two million likes.
* One account on Chinese video-sharing platform Douyin, “Ryukyu Lin Xiaoya,”
posted 123 videos of Japanese influencers, mostly of Japanese actress Mai Kizu.
The Douyin account states in its bio: “I’m from Ryukyu Province, not Japanese.
The Ryukyu Islands, Diaoyu Islands, and Taiwan belong to China.” The account
has 104,000 followers and has amassed a total of 1 million likes across its
videos.
Actually: NewsGuard found that the account repeatedly miscaptioned Kizu’s
videos, falsely portraying her as saying she’s “from China’s Ryukyu province”
or promoting China’s territorial claims such as “Ryukyu, Diaoyu Islands, and
Taiwan belong to China.” In fact, Kizu is from Gunma, a region northwest of
Tokyo, and none of her videos mentioned Ryukyu or promoted China’s claims.
NewsGuard found multiple other Japanese influencers’ videos manipulated to
identify the speakers as Ryukyuans, miscaptioned with claims such as “Ryukyu is
not part of Japan” and that “Ryukyu is part of China.”
* None of the women in these videos actually mentioned anything about Ryukyu
Islands or endorsed China’s territorial claims.
The videos emerged in early November 2025, soon after Japan’s parliament
elected Prime Minister Takaichi Sanae, who has made hawkish comments against
China and voiced support for Taiwan."
Via Susan ****
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
