Beijing tries to mend business ties with Japan

Chinese Vice Premier Wu Yi (吳儀) was seeing business leaders yesterday at the start of a trip to Japan where she plans to take forward relations that have seen major strains.

Wu is due to meet with Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi during the eight-day visit but began with the trip's stated aim: the World Exposition, a global showcase of technology near the central Japanese industrial city of Nagoya.

After arriving Tuesday evening she held a private dinner with the Expo's chief Shoichiro Toyoda, who is the honorary chairman of Japan's largest company Toyota Motor, a major investor in China.

She told Toyoda she hoped to take forward bilateral relations on the ideas set out by President Hu Jintao (胡錦濤), who said Japan must back up its words of remorse for the past with deeds.

Hu made the demand as one of five proposals as a hastily arranged bilateral summit with Koizumi on the sidelines of an Asia-Africa meet in Jakarta last month.

"She told Mr Toyoda how she plans to meet Japanese officials to discuss details of the five principles stated at the China-Japan summit," said Huang Hing Yuan, a spokesman for the Chinese embassy in Tokyo.

Wu met yesterday with local business leaders in Nagoya and talked about the importance of urban renewal. She was due to head today for China's national day in the six-month Expo.

Beijing decided to send Wu, an veteran negotiator and Politburo member, instead of Prime Minister Wen Jiabao (溫家寶) who was invited by Koizumi to the Expo.

Analysts viewed the move as a sign that China wanted to send an official for serious talks with Japan but without the symbolism of such a high-ranking visit.

No top Chinese leader has been to Japan since prime minister Zhu Rongji (朱鎔基) in October 2000.

Relations were badly strained by protests last month in Chinese cities, in which Japanese missions were damaged. The protests were sparked by Tokyo's approval of a nationalist history textbook that downplayed Japan's war crimes.

Beijing and other Asian countries have also been outraged by visits by Japanese leaders, including Koizumi, to the Yasukuni shrine which honors the country's 2.5 million war dead, including war criminals.

China angrily protested Tuesday after Koizumi suggested he might again visit the shrine, defending the pilgrimages by saying that Japan was staunchly pacifist 60 years after World War II.

Japanese Ambassador to China Koreshige Anami said yesterday that Beijing's real concern was to block Tokyo's cherished bid for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council.