Toyota posts drop in new car sales in China

The Icy relations between Japan and China have hurt Toyota’s sales of new cars in China. They fell more than 13 percent in the January-to-February period from a year earlier. Toyota Motor announced that it sold 36,300 cars in February. The figure marks a drop of 45.7 percent in sales from a year earlier. Toyota attributes the drop to the Chinese Lunar New Year holidays, which was in February this year. The holidays were in January last year. Toyota’s sales in the January-to-February period stood at 108,800 units. That’s still 13.3 percent less from a year earlier. The drop is smaller than the decrease seen in sales last December. But it reflects the chilled ties between Japan and China caused by a territorial dispute over islets in the East China Sea.