Arrest after collision with coastguard ships in disputed waters sparked row between Japan and China

This article is more than 10 years old

This article is more than 10 years old

Japanese prosecutors have released the captain of a Chinese fishing boat, two weeks after a collision in disputed waters sparked a dramatic deterioration in ties between Beijing and Tokyo.

Zhan Qixiong was arrested on 8 September, a day after his ship collided with two Japanese coastguard vessels near the Senkakus, a group of uninhabited islands in the East China Sea that are claimed by both countries.

Prosecutors on the southern Japanese island of Okinawa, where Zhan was detained, said they would monitor both governments' response to their decision before deciding whether to indict him, but that course of action is looking increasingly unlikely.

They said the row caused by Zhan's detention and the possible impact on Japan-China ties had been a factor in their decision.

They accepted that Zhan had not intended to damage the Japanese vessels, but said he had been to blame by ignoring repeated requests to leave the area.

"We have decided that further investigation while keeping the captain in custody would not be appropriate, considering the impact on the people of our country as well as Japan-China relations in the future," the district's vice-prosecutor, Toru Suzuki, said.

The Senkakus, which are controlled by Japan, are surrounded by rich fishing grounds and near potentially huge undersea oil and gas deposits. Analysts say that underlying the dispute is rivalry between the countries over control of the East China Sea for strategic reasons and for control of the area's natural resources.

Japanese officials had earlier warned that the swift deterioration in bilateral ties posed a threat to the economies of both countries.

China was Japan's largest trading partner last year and Japan was China's third largest. Bilateral trade reached $147bn (£93.6bn) in the first half of this year – a jump of 34.5% over the same time last year, Japanese figures show.

"A cooling of relations between Japan and China over the Senkaku problem would be bad for Japan's economy, but it would also be a minus for China," Japan's finance minister, Yoshihiko Noda, said.

"It's desirable that both sides respond in a calm manner."

Liu Jiangyong, an expert on China-Japan relations at Tsinghua University in Beijing, said the prosecutors' decision could go some way towards repairing the damage to bilateral ties.