The top diplomats for China, South Korea and Japan are to meet in Tokyo this weekend for talks, Seoul said yesterday, as the neighbors move to bolster regional ties.
South Korean Minister of Foreign Affairs Cho Tae-yul and his Japanese and Chinese counterparts, Iwaya Takeshi and Wang Yi (王毅), are to “exchange comprehensive views ... for the development of trilateral cooperation,” Seoul’s foreign ministry said in a statement.
The meeting in Tokyo on Saturday will be the 11th trilateral ministerial meeting, the statement said, with the last such meeting held in November 2023 in the South Korean port city of Busan.
Photo: AFP
The countries are also to hold bilateral talks on the sidelines of the three-way summit, Seoul added.
Japanese public broadcaster NHK said the meeting was “expected to discuss concrete cooperation in a wide range of areas, such as people-to-people exchanges, economic cooperation and measures to combat the falling birthrate.”
The top diplomats were also set “to agree to coordinate the holding of a summit meeting of the three countries by the end of the year.”
NHK said Tokyo also aims to resolve some outstanding bilateral issues, “ such as China’s measures to suspend imports of Japanese fisheries products.”
In May last year, the leaders of the three countries held a rare summit in Seoul — the first such high level talks in five years — at which they agreed to deepen trade ties.
The three countries also reaffirmed their commitment to the “denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula” — a reference to nuclear-armed North Korea.
Seoul and Tokyo typically take a stronger line against Pyongyang than does China, which remains one of North Korea’s most important allies and economic benefactors, despite leader Kim Jong-un’s recent moves to bolster ties with historic ally Russia.
Beijing has previously resisted condemning Pyongyang for its weapons tests, instead criticizing joint US-South Korea drills for raising tension.
Seoul and Washington accuse Pyongyang of sending thousands of North Korean soldiers to help Russia fight its war against Ukraine, in return for technical assistance from Moscow for its banned weapons programs.
Experts say any moves by Seoul, Tokyo and Beijing to ramp up trilateral cooperation and boost economic ties augers well for future agreements on more difficult topics like Kim’s nuclear weapons.
The announcement comes as South Korea awaits a Constitutional Court’s ruling on whether to remove President Yoon Suk-yeol from office over his botched martial law declaration in December.
While in office, Yoon has pushed for closer ties with Japan, attempting to bury the historical hatchet to present a united trilateral front with the US against North Korea’s growing military provocations.
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
‘BODIES EVERYWHERE’: The incident occurred at a Filipino festival celebrating an anti-colonial leader, with the driver described as a ‘lone suspect’ known to police Canadian police arrested a man on Saturday after a car plowed into a street party in the western Canadian city of Vancouver, killing a number of people. Authorities said the incident happened shortly after 8pm in Vancouver’s Sunset on Fraser neighborhood as members of the Filipino community gathered to celebrate Lapu Lapu Day. The festival, which commemorates a Filipino anti-colonial leader from the 16th century, falls this year on the weekend before Canada’s election. A 30-year-old local man was arrested at the scene, Vancouver police wrote on X. The driver was a “lone suspect” known to police, a police spokesperson told journalists at the
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has unveiled a new naval destroyer, claiming it as a significant advancement toward his goal of expanding the operational range and preemptive strike capabilities of his nuclear-armed military, state media said yesterday. North Korea’s state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said Kim attended the launching ceremony for the 5,000-tonne warship on Friday at the western port of Nampo. Kim framed the arms buildup as a response to perceived threats from the US and its allies in Asia, who have been expanding joint military exercises amid rising tensions over the North’s nuclear program. He added that the acquisition