After a year in which relations strained to breaking point, Japan and China have a chance to take a small step forward next year with the departure of Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi.
Koizumi, the longest serving Japanese premier in a generation, insists he will step down in September after five and a half years of breaking post-World War II taboos, most recently moving to revise the pacifist Constitution.
Koizumi will enter the new year closer than ever to US President George W. Bush and unflinching toward Beijing.
"A new prime minister will always have an opportunity to make a fresh gesture to improve relations. And I think Chinese leaders would also like to seize the opportunity," said Joseph Cheng (
But however much it criticizes Koizumi, China may find the next prime minister even less to its liking, with opinions hardening in both countries.
The most mentioned possibility -- including by Koizumi himself -- is Shinzo Abe, 51, a third-generation politician who made his name talking tough on North Korea.
Abe was given the powerful chief Cabinet secretary's position on Oct. 31 when Koizumi elevated prominent hardliners in a reshuffle.
Much can happen in nine months, though, and some analysts see momentum to choose a different type of premier who would repair relations with China, Japan's largest trading partner.
Koizumi, with his love of offbeat photo-ops and passion for rock music, has been phenomenally successful at home campaigning not on foreign policy, but on shaking up the establishment.
He won a historic landslide in Sept. 11 elections after purging from his long-dominant Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) the opponents of his signature reform of privatizing the powerful post office.
"In the name of political reform, Koizumi completely shoved aside members of other factions. I think those who have been suppressed will start fighting back in the parliament session opening in late January," said Kaoru Okano, a professor of political science at Meiji University.
The Bush administration will also quietly push for Koizumi's successor not to antagonize China further, Okano said.
Candidates to follow Koizumi who would mend ties with China include Finance Minister Sadakazu Tanigaki, Trade Minister Toshihiro Nikai and Yasuo Fukuda, a former chief Cabinet secretary sidelined by Koizumi, analyst Mamoru Morita said.
Both Abe and Foreign Minister Taro Aso, another aspirant to be premier, are staunch defenders of Koizumi's visits to the Yasukuni shrine, which honors 2.5 million Japanese war dead including 14 war criminals.
Aso infuriated China recently by declaring Beijing to be a "considerable threat" due to its rising military spending.
With Japan enjoying strong US support and pressing ahead on such ventures as revising its Constitution, any improvement of ties with its neighbors would require give-and-take.
"One has to be aware that you have structural factors in Japan such as the LDP trying to exploit nationalist feelings, the Japanese yearning to be treated as a normal state and Japan in general would like to secure a higher status in the international community," Cheng said.
"So it requires China and South Korea to appreciate the trend and to make adjustments in their postures toward Japan," he said.
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