China top general visits Japan WWII chemical weapons site

In this Nov. 30, 2015, photo, US President Barack Obama (left) meets with Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the COP21 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Le Bourget, outside Paris. By visiting Hiroshima, Obama parachutes himself into a seemingly endless dispute among key US allies and trading partners over World War II. In Tokyo’’s decades-long tug-of-war over history with its neighbors China and South Korea, it’s the American president who could end up losing. AP

BEIJING—China’s top general is calling on Japan to speed up work on the disposal of chemical weapons left in China at the end of World War II.

Gen. Fan Changlong was visiting a major disposal site Thursday on the eve of President Barack Obama’s visit to a Japanese city destroyed by a US nuclear bomb at the end of the war.

Defense ministry spokesperson Col. Yang Yujun said the Chinese general’s visit was planned long in advance and was unrelated to Obama’s visit to Hiroshima. Yang said Fan’s inspection visit was intended to emphasize the importance of the work at the Haerbaling site.

China has been at pains to counter attempts by some in Japan use Obama’s visit to portray their country as a war victim.