http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AS_JAPAN_NAMING_ISLANDS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2014-08-01-06-01-50
TOKYO (AP) -- Japan on Friday named five uninhabited small isles belonging to an island group in the center of a dispute with China as part of efforts to reinforce its claim, a move likely to spark anger from Beijing and another claimant, Taiwan.
The five islands, named after directions of the compass, are part of the group in the East China Sea known as the Senkaku in Japanese and the Diaoyu in Chinese. Five bigger islands in the group already have names. Chinese and Japanese coast guard ships have regularly confronted each other in surrounding waters.
The five were among 158 islands that were named Friday and their list published on a website of the Japanese maritime policy department. The other islands elsewhere in the Japanese waters are not disputed.
The government said that naming the islands is meant to raise public awareness that they belong to Japan. The names are mostly those customarily used among local residents, and will be used in new maps and maritime charts, officials at the maritime department said.
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