China, Japan, Korea relations ‘restored’

Premier Li Keqiang and President Park Geun-hye witnessed the signing of 17 deals after a one-on-one meeting at the presidential Blue House in Seoul.

Abe took office in late 2012 and Park in early 2013.

Japan maintains that the comfort women issue was settled in a 1965 normalisation agreement, which saw Tokyo make a total payment of $800 million in grants or loans to its former colony.

“I hope today’s summit will heal the bitter history in a broad sense and be a honest one and an important opportunity to develop the two countries’ relationship”, Park said before the meeting, according to Reuters.

The proposal came as Li addressed the China-Japan-South Korea business summit hours after he met with South Korean President Park Geun-hye and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in the widely-watched trilateral summit that had resumed after a three-and-half-year break.

The China-Japan-South Korea summit had taken place annually from 2008 to 2012 before it bogged down due to Japanese provocations on historical and territorial issues that angered both China and South Korea.

South Korean and Chinese ties with Japan have been troubled by what they see as repeated failures by leaders in Tokyo to properly atone for wartime atrocities, in particular for Seoul over “comfort women”, as the mostly Korean women forced into prostitution at Japanese military brothels are called.

Abe will say that the activities are “unilateral attempts to change the status quo” and will urge China to respect freedom of navigation and global rules, according to the officials.

South Korea’s Trade, Industry and Energy Minister Yoon Sang-jick, center, tries to hold hands to pose for the media with Japan’s Economy, Trade and Industry Minister Motoo Hayashi, left, and China global Trade Representative Zhong Shan.

A joint declaration released after the trilateral summit says the three countries reaffirmed their commitment to hold the trilateral meeting on a regular basis.

Despite protests from Seoul and Beijing, Abe hasn’t yielded on his nationalism.

About 28,500 US troops are stationed in South Korea as deterrence against potential aggression from rival North Korea.

US Defense Secretary Ash Carter called on North Korea to shrink and eventually eliminate its nuclear weapons program, while acknowledging during a visit yesterday to the Demilitarized Zone dividing the two Koreas that prospects for reconciling with the defiant North are dim.

“It’s the 50th anniversary of the normalisation of (Japan-South Korea) ties this year”. “We remain committed to achieving that negotiated outcome with North Korea, and believe that they should be on the path of doing less, and ultimately zero, in the nuclear field, not to be doing more“.

This meeting in Seoul symbolizes intent of the three largest economies in Northeast Asia to reap significant diplomatic and economic gains from closer cooperation.

“At the outset of the meeting, they agreed that ties between Japan and China are on a recovery trend, but that the momentum should be strengthened further”, Hagiuda said.

South Korea, China, Japan and North Korea are all members of now-dormant global negotiations on ending Pyongyang’s nuclear ambitions.