24 January 2013 Last updated at 03:05 ET <\/p>\n
A small boat carrying Taiwanese activists trying to reach a group of East China Sea islands at the heart of a territorial dispute has been forced back by the Japanese coastguard. <\/p>\n
The activists were sailing towards the islands, known as Senkaku in Japan, Diaoyutai in Taiwan and Diaoyu in China, to install an idol of a goddess. <\/p>\n
China and Taiwan both claim the island chain, which is controlled by Japan. <\/p>\n
The island row has left ties between Tokyo and Beijing severely strained. <\/p>\n
The fishing boat is reported to have been carrying four activists as well as the Taiwanese captain, an Indonesian employee and a news cameraman. It was being escorted by four Taiwanese coastguard vessels. <\/p>\n
They left Taiwan in the early hours and reportedly wanted to place the statue of a Taiwanese sea goddess who is traditionally believed to protect fishermen on one of the islands in the group, which lie south of Okinawa and north of Taiwan. <\/p>\n
The BBC's Rupert Wingfield-Hayes says this was seen as placing a symbolic territorial claim on the islands. Video footage of the activists before they left Taiwan showed them chanting \"Japan, get out of Diaoyutai\" and \"Return Diaoyutai\". <\/p>\n
But as the vessel approached the islands mid-morning the Japanese coastguard issued verbal warnings for it to stop, then used water cannon to force it to turn back. <\/p>\n
\"Our patrol boat carried out restrictions on the vessel such as blocking its path and discharging water,\" the coastguard said in a statement. <\/p>\n
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