Former Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, in an interview aired Tuesday, indicated that from Beijing's point of view, the Japan-held Senkaku Islands are Chinese territory based on the 1943 Cairo Declaration issued by the Allies.

In the interview conducted Monday in Tokyo with Hong Kong's Phoenix Television, Hatoyama said it was unavoidable that China would state that Japan stole the uninhabited islets in the East China Sea. The program was aired in and outside of China on Tuesday morning.

Hatoyama, 66, who was in power between September 2009 and June 2010 as head of the Democratic Party of Japan, did not run in last December's general election and is no longer in the Diet.