Former high-level military officers and prominent scholars from China and Japan have called on Beijing and Tokyo to stop the "endless" dispute over the Diaoyu Islands that is muddying relations between the world's second- and third-largest economies.

"Don't talk anymore about who owns the islands ... We should prevent military collisions at sea, set up hot lines and build mutual trust," former Japanese defense minister Shigeru Ishiba said at the sub-conference for security affairs at the eighth Beijing-Tokyo Forum on Monday.

The former minister also suggested the Japanese government send the Japanese Coast Guard, not the Japan Self-Defense Forces, to handle possible accidents in the disputed waters.