Fukuda, Hu to okay regular visits

Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda and Chinese President Hu Jintao are likely to agree on building a framework for alternating annual visits by leaders of the two countries, the Yomiuri Shimbun reported.

The Japanese and the Chinese governments hope the planned regular visits will become a symbol of the strategic and mutually beneficial relations that they have vowed to strengthen. The agreement is expected to be incorporated in political documents that Fukuda and Hu are scheduled to announce after the talks.

During the summit talks, Fukuda and Hu are expected to agree on enhancing the mutually beneficial political, economic and cultural ties between the two countries.

The two leaders are likely to incorporate plans to build a mechanism for regular reciprocal visits by leaders as one of the main pillars of their agreement. The Japanese and the Chinese governments are in the final stages of coordinating plans for the leaders of the two nations to alternately visit each other at least once a year, excluding visits for occasions such as international conferences, including the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum.

Although visits by Japanese and Chinese leaders continued at a pace of once every two to three years after the two countries normalized diplomatic relations in 1972, they were not previously placed on a regular political schedule because of various diplomatic issues and frictions.

Visits by Japanese and Chinese leaders to each others' countries were suspended for five years after then Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi visited China in October 2001, mainly due to China's objections to Koizumi's repeated visits to the Yasukuni Shrine.

Former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe visited Beijing in October 2006 soon after taking office in September in a bid to patch up strained bilateral relations. Subsequently, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao visited Japan in April the following year, the first visit by a Chinese leader in over 6 years.

Despite irritants, Hu's visit historic

Chinese President Hu Jintao's five-day visit to Japan is undoubtedly an event of historic importance. It is the first trip to Japan by China's paramount leader in 10 years since Hu's predecessor, Jiang Zemin, came here in 1998, the Asahi Shimbun said.

When Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda visited China late last year, he voiced his wish to bolster ties between the two Asian powers.

Hu's travel will be followed by other important events, including the annual Group of Eight (G8) summit in the Lake Toyako resort in Hokkaido and the Summer Olympics in Beijing. After many years of attempts to keep Japan's diplomatic relationship with China on track, Fukuda seized the opportunity to stress his determination to pursue the goal with continued zeal.

Although some unfortunate events such as the dumpling poisoning incident, the recent Tibet riots and the subsequent disruptions of the Olympic torch relay have dampened the balmy diplomatic climate, the current ties between Tokyo and Beijing are better than they were in the past decade.

Most importantly, the fundamental dynamics of Japan-China relations have changed dramatically. Issues concerning Japan's wartime past are no longer the principal threat to bilateral relations as they were in the past.

China is now on a historical path toward becoming a leading political and economic power in the world.

However, Fukuda himself is in political hot waters, with his Cabinet's approval ratings languishing around 20 percent. Many politicians within his Liberal Democratic Party are calling for a hard-line stance toward China over the Tibet and other issues.

Still, the summit between the two leaders to be held this week carries significance. With its huge economic, political and military presence, China's actions are being closely watched by the rest of the world. But unfair criticism of China is likely to create a rift between China and the rest of the world. If this rift continues to deepen, it would hurt the interests of both the world and China, the newspaper said.

(China Daily 05/07/2008 page9)