The multinational vessels attending the western pacific naval symposium are set to participate in a joint drill on April 23, to celebrate the 65th anniversary of China’s navy. However, the Japanese maritime self defense force was not invited to the drill. PLA navy spokesman Liang Yang explains.

"Japanese leaders’ erroneous words and deeds, as well as a series of wrong steps taken by the Japanese government, have not only seriously hurt the feelings of the Chinese people, they also seriously affected bilateral relations. So under the circumstances, we did not arrange any meeting between General Wu Shengli and Japanese maritime Self Defense Force officials.” Liang said.