Taipei: Taiwan’s leader ate sushi, or rice balls, to show his support for Japan after China signaled it would ban all Japanese seafood imports, while Taiwan’s foreign minister said China was using economic and military intimidation against other countries. Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen posted photos on various social media platforms today of herself enjoying a lunch of rice balls, which included yellowtail, or hamachi, from Kagoshima prefecture, and scallops, or hotate, from Japan’s Hokkaido prefecture. The Taiwanese leader posted on Facebook and Instagram that her lunch was sushi and miso soup, and posted the same message in Japanese on the platform X.

According to Thai News Agency, earlier in the day, Taiwanese Foreign Minister Lin Jia-long told reporters at the parliament that China has used economic coercion and military intimidation to bully other countries, and has used trade, investment, and tourism as weapons to attack Taiwan. Therefore, at this crucial time, Taiwan must support Japan to effectively stabilize the situation and stop China’s bullying behavior.

Taiwan has expressed its support for Japan after Japanese state media reported yesterday that China has informed Japanese authorities that it will ban all seafood imports from Japan, citing continued monitoring of the release of treated wastewater from Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant. This comes after it only partially relaxed restrictions on seafood imports from Japan earlier this year. It is China’s latest retaliation after Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi told lawmakers earlier this month that an attack on Taiwan would threaten Japan’s survival and could lead to military retaliation. China has been deeply displeased, calling on the Japanese leader to retract his remarks and warning Chinese citizens to avoid travel to Japan.