Chinese and Japanese foreign ministers will meet on the
sidelines of an ASEAN meeting to discuss China-Japan relations and
regional issues in Northeast Asia, official sources said today.
According to the Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesman's Office,
Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing will hold bilateral consultations with
his Japanese counterpart Taro Aso in Kuala Lumpur during the
seventh foreign ministers' meeting between the ASEAN and China,
Japan and South Korea (10+3) from July 26 to 28.
"They will discuss China-Japan relations and regional issues,
including the Northeast Asian situation," sources with the Foreign
Ministry said.
Sino-Japanese relations have been soured by Japanese Prime
Minister Junichiro Koizumi's repeated visits to the Yasukuni
Shrine, where Japan's war dead, including 14 class-A criminals in
WWII, are honored.
The leaders of the two countries halted exchange visits after
Koizumi's homage to the war shrine soon after he took office in
2001.
This will be Li's second meeting with Aso since Aso became
Japan's foreign minister last year.
Their first meeting was held in Qatar on the sidelines of the
Asia Cooperation Dialogue conference in May.
The meeting between Li and Aso is expected to take place
Thursday on the sidelines of the ASEAN meeting, sources said.
The upcoming meeting was just decided by Monday, with the help
of various channels, sources said.
"The arrangement of the meeting spells out the message that
China and Japan hope to keep contacts and mend ties," Pang
Zhongying, an international relations expert, told Xinhua News
Agency Tuesday.
China and Japan have had a number of frequent wrangles beyond
Japanese leader's Yasukuni Shrine visits, including disputes over
the East China Sea gas and oil resources.
China and Japan held the sixth round of the East China Sea talks
in Beijing in early July, but great differences still remain.
The two countries also met for security talks last Friday,
agreeing on increased defense exchanges.
In an exclusive interview with Xinhua yesterday, the ASEAN
Secretary-General Ong Keng Yong said the nuclear issue on the
Korean Peninsula would be a focal point of the impending ASEAN
foreign ministers meeting.
The ASEAN chief said ASEAN is committed to a peaceful Korean
Peninsula and wish the six parties to come together to find a
solution.
Almost all major players in the six-party talks on the Korean
Peninsula nuclear issue have confirmed their participation in the
meetings in Kuala Lumpur.
"Diplomatic efforts are being made to hold foreign ministers'
talks of the six countries on the sidelines of the ASEAN Regional
Forum (ARF)," said Chun Young-woo, South Korea's top envoy to the
six-party talks.
The six-party talks remained stalled since the last round of
meeting was held in Beijing last November.
The last round of talks, involving China, the US, Russia, Japan,
South and North Korea, ended up with a Chairman's Statement, in
which the parties concerned agreed to resume the talks as soon as
possible.
"I think China is certainly showing evidence of that (becoming a
responsible stakeholder). I thought the North Korea example was a
good one," Rice said ahead of her departure for the ASEAN
meetings.
The ASEAN groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia,
Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
(Xinhua News Agency July 25, 2006)
