China-Japan Security Chiefs Meet in Beijing... Coordinating Summit at South America Meeting This Month

Both Countries Confirm Direction for Promoting 'Strategic Reciprocal Relationship'

Top security officials from China and Japan met in Beijing on the 4th to coordinate the holding of a bilateral summit.

According to Japan's Kyodo News on the day, Wang Yi, Director of the Central Foreign Affairs Office of the Chinese Communist Party (also serving as Foreign Minister), and Takeo Akiba, Director-General of Japan's National Security Secretariat, held talks in Beijing.

[Image source=Yonhap News]

After the meeting, Director Akiba told reporters that they confirmed the shared direction of promoting a "strategic and mutually beneficial relationship" that expands common interests between the two countries.

Kyodo News reported that Director Wang and Director Akiba also communicated on issues and cooperation between the two countries to hold a summit between Chinese President Xi Jinping and Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, timed with an international conference to be held in South America this month.

Prime Minister Ishiba, attending an event on the same day, stated that he plans to attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit to be held in Peru on the 15th-16th and the Group of Twenty (G20) summit to be held in Brazil on the 18th-19th, and that he is coordinating the holding of US-Japan and China-Japan summits locally.

Director Akiba also requested Director Wang to take concrete measures for the resumption of Chinese imports of Japanese seafood products.

China banned imports of Japanese seafood in August last year in response to the discharge of contaminated water from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant (referred to by the Japanese government as "treated water") into the ocean, but expressed its intention to resume imports last September; however, the specific timing for resumption has not yet been decided.

The meeting also addressed issues such as the fatal stabbing of a Japanese elementary school student in Shenzhen, southern China, in September, and the successive arrests of Japanese nationals in China on charges of violating the Anti-Espionage Law.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.