China did not contest Japan’s sovereignty over the Senkaku Islands for many years. However, after the potential existence of seabed resources was reported, they suddenly began their own assertions on territorial sovereignty over the islands.

As the report of a United Nations agency pointed out the potential existence of oil reserves in the East China Sea, China, which had previously never made any claim concerning the Senkaku Islands, began to make their own assertions on the territorial sovereignty over the Senkaku Islands in 1971, 76 years after the cabinet decision of Japan.