Abe visit to boost trade relations: FM
▶ Sides to explore tech cooperation
Shinzo Abe’s visit to China will boost trade cooperation between the two countries amid US unilateralism, Chinese observers noted after the Japanese premier arrived in Beijing on Thursday.
China hopes the visit of Abe will be successful and fruitful to promote China-Japan relations, Hua Chunying, spokesperson of China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said at a routine press briefing on Thursday.
At the important moment of the 40th anniversary of the signing of China-Japan Treaty of Peace and Friendship, the two sides should make full use of the visit to confirm that China and Japan are partners and should improve and develop bilateral relations, Hua said.
“The visit will be pragmatic, and push forward the mutual visits by leaders of the two countries in the future,” Liu Jiangyong, vice dean of the Institute of Modern International Relations at Tsinghua University in Beijing, told the Global Times on Thursday.
“Positive factors have always existed in China-Japan relations,” Gao Hong, a research fellow with the Institute of Japanese Studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing, told the Global Times on Thursday.
“Japan has been actively seeking improvement of its relations with China in recent years. It signals that Abe’s visit has been expected for a long time,” he said.
Analysts stressed that issues left by history will not be immediately resolved, but they should not hinder future development of bilateral ties.
At the invitation of Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, Abe is visiting China until Saturday, the Xinhua News Agency reported.
Li and Abe visited a photo exhibition of China-Japan economic and commercial cooperation and attended a ceremony to mark the 40th anniversary of the signing of China-Japan Treaty of Peace and Friendship on Thursday, Hua said.
Abe wrote in a written interview with Chinese media ahead of his visit that Japan has rich experience in dealing with issues such as environmental pollution and an aging population, which can serve as a reference for China’s further reform and opening-up, Xinhua reported on Wednesday.
During Abe’s visit, the two will hold the First China-Japan Third-Market Cooperation Forum and explore how to improve cooperation in areas such as technology and finance, Hua said.