Japan’s PM Fumio Kishida and US President Joe Biden have first in-person meeting, agree to enhance ties
- Kishida and Biden agreed to cooperate toward a free and open Indo-Pacific amid China’s growing assertiveness in the region
- He also met British PM Boris Johnson, Australian PM Scott Morrison and Vietnamese PM Pham Minh Chinh at the UN climate summit in Glasgow
Kishida also met his counterparts from Britain, Australia and Vietnam on the sidelines of the UN climate summit in Glasgow. Tokyo views these countries as key partners in advancing a free and open region, and agreed to forge closer ties with them.
The flurry of diplomatic activity took place during Kishida’s brief first foreign trip as the Japanese leader. He departed following Sunday’s general election in which his governing coalition won a comfortable majority in the House of Representatives.
After arriving in the Scottish city of Glasgow earlier on Tuesday, Kishida had a brief conversation with Biden, according to the Japanese Foreign Ministry.
Kishida told reporters later in the day he agreed with Biden to meet again at the earliest date possible, which could be later this year, to have more “thorough” discussions.
The former long-serving foreign minister already had phone talks with Biden after being elected prime minister by parliament last month, but it was the first time that the two met face-to-face while serving in their current positions.
The negotiations for a Reciprocal Access Agreement come as Britain has been stepping up its engagement in the region, partly propelled by Beijing’s undermining of democracy and human rights in Hong Kong, a former British colony.
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China has conflicting territorial claims with four members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) – Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam – as well as Taiwan in the South China Sea, a strategic waterway through which more than one-third of global trade passes.
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Beijing also claims the Diaoyu Islands, which Japan calls the Senkaku, a group of uninhabited islets in the East China Sea administered by Japan. China has frequently sent its coastguard ships near the chain of islets.
Kishida and his Vietnamese counterpart agreed to cooperate over supply chain issues, given that many Japanese companies have production and other corporate bases in the Southeast Asian country, and to accelerate talks to promote Japanese defence exports, according to the Japanese Foreign Ministry.