Senior Chinese and Japanese officials were to hold talks yesterday aimed at healing division between the Asian powers over rival claims to gas deposits in disputed territory and historical issues left over from World War II.
Japanese Vice Foreign Minister Shotaro Yachi was traveling to Beijing yesterday, with talks to begin later in the day, according to the Japanese embassy.
The dialogue is the third round of "strategic talks" aimed at improving soured ties following violent anti-Japanese protests last spring over Tokyo's wartime aggression and its bid for a permanent UN Security Council seat.
The exchange is likely to include other issues, such as the multination effort to get North Korea to give up its nuclear-weapons program, both sides said.
Yachi reportedly met with his South Korean counterpart, Yu Myung-hwan, in Tokyo on Thursday before heading to Beijing. Contents of their discussion were not available, but South Korea, along with Japan, Russia, China and the US are participating in talks with North Korea on its nuclear program.
"These are strategic talks that could be about anything. They will cover a wide range of issues," said Keiji Ide, a spokesman for the Japanese embassy in Beijing.
"This is a very good occasion to have a good discussion," he said.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Kong Quan (孔泉), speaking at a briefing on Thursday, described the atmosphere of the last round of talks, which were held in Tokyo in June, as "pragmatic and productive."
But he noted, "we have our serious disputes."
He said he hoped both sides would show similar flexibility in Beijing "so that we can achieve the objective to find a solution through peace and talks and dialogue."
Ide said he could not comment on a report early yesterday by Japan's Kyodo News agency that Japanese Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura will visit Beijing on Oct. 23 and Oct. 24 for talks with Chinese Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing (
Japan has complained that China is drilling for undersea gas in a disputed area between the two countries, and has started work on a gas pipeline. Beijing says it is within its rights to develop resources in the region.
China and other neighboring countries have chastised Japan for textbooks that critics say gloss over its wartime atrocities throughout Asia.
Beijing also has criticized Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi for paying visits to a Tokyo war shrine that honors the country's war dead, including convicted Class A war criminals.
Koizumi has gone to the shrine four times since becoming prime minister in April 2001, and is expected to go again before the end of this year.
‘UNUSUAL EVENT’: The Australian defense minister said that the Chinese navy task group was entitled to be where it was, but Australia would be watching it closely The Australian and New Zealand militaries were monitoring three Chinese warships moving unusually far south along Australia’s east coast on an unknown mission, officials said yesterday. The Australian government a week ago said that the warships had traveled through Southeast Asia and the Coral Sea, and were approaching northeast Australia. Australian Minister for Defence Richard Marles yesterday said that the Chinese ships — the Hengyang naval frigate, the Zunyi cruiser and the Weishanhu replenishment vessel — were “off the east coast of Australia.” Defense officials did not respond to a request for comment on a Financial Times report that the task group from
DEFENSE UPHEAVAL: Trump was also to remove the first woman to lead a military service, as well as the judge advocates general for the army, navy and air force US President Donald Trump on Friday fired the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force General C.Q. Brown, and pushed out five other admirals and generals in an unprecedented shake-up of US military leadership. Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social that he would nominate former lieutenant general Dan “Razin” Caine to succeed Brown, breaking with tradition by pulling someone out of retirement for the first time to become the top military officer. The president would also replace the head of the US Navy, a position held by Admiral Lisa Franchetti, the first woman to lead a military service,
Four decades after they were forced apart, US-raised Adamary Garcia and her birth mother on Saturday fell into each other’s arms at the airport in Santiago, Chile. Without speaking, they embraced tearfully: A rare reunification for one the thousands of Chileans taken from their mothers as babies and given up for adoption abroad. “The worst is over,” Edita Bizama, 64, said as she beheld her daughter for the first time since her birth 41 years ago. Garcia had flown to Santiago with four other women born in Chile and adopted in the US. Reports have estimated there were 20,000 such cases from 1950 to
CONFIDENT ON DEAL: ‘Ukraine wants a seat at the table, but wouldn’t the people of Ukraine have a say? It’s been a long time since an election, the US president said US President Donald Trump on Tuesday criticized Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and added that he was more confident of a deal to end the war after US-Russia talks. Trump increased pressure on Zelenskiy to hold elections and chided him for complaining about being frozen out of talks in Saudi Arabia. The US president also suggested that he could meet Russian President Vladimir Putin before the end of the month as Washington overhauls its stance toward Russia. “I’m very disappointed, I hear that they’re upset about not having a seat,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida when asked about the Ukrainian