Unfinished business and lingering grudges from early in the previous century are causing relations between Japan and China to sour even further.  Authorities in Shanghai have seized a Japanese ship over claims dating back to the 1930s, and 150 Japanese lawmakers paid a visit to a shrine that Beijing abhors.

The conservative members of parliament paid their respects to Japan’s war dead at the Yasukuni Shrine, which also commemorates Class-A war criminals from World War II responsible for atrocities committed against China.  Beijing already condemned Prime Minister Shinzo Abe for sending an offering to the shrine a day earlier.

A day earlier, China impounded the Mitsui O.S.K. Line iron ore carrier Baosteel Emotion.  A Shanghai maritime court in 2010 ruled that the line must reimburse China, because its corporate predecessor – Daido Kaiun – chartered two Chinese ships in 1936, which were later taken by the Japanese government for the war.  Japan insists that all World War II claims were settled in an agreement in 1972, and that China’s actions will have a “chilling effect” on all Japanese companies doing business in China.

“We are deeply apprehensive,” said government spokesman Yoshihide Suga in Tokyo.