China, Japan to restart strategic talks
▶ Experts see impressive potential in bilateral ties
The Chinese Foreign Ministry announced on Thursday that China will hold a new round of strategic dialogue with Japan after a seven-year hiatus of the bilateral talks, covering a wide range of topics.
The good momentum of bilateral high-level exchanges is set to bring closer economic cooperation between the world’s second- and third- largest economies amid a bruising ChinaUS trade war, according to experts.
China and Japan will hold a new round of strategic dialogue on Saturday in Japan, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said on Thursday.
The dialogue will be co-hosted by Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Le Yucheng and his Japanese counterpart Takeo Akiba, Hua said.
China hopes to enhance mutual political trust and promote the improvement and development of bilateral relations through the dialogue, Hua added. “This is the resumption of the dialogue after seven years.”
The resumption of strategic dialogue shows good momentum of bilateral high-level exchanges that have been launched since the top leaders of the two countries met in Osaka, Japan ahead of the G20 Summit, and warming bilateral ties are set to boost the recovering economic cooperation between the two nations, experts said.
“Economic cooperation between China and Japan has great potential, and now the two countries share a common stance of maintaining and improving the current multilateralism in global trade against US’ rising unilateralism,” Chen Zilei, director of the Research Center for Japanese Economics at the Shanghai University of International Business and Economics, told the Global Times on Thursday.
“Promising opportunities lie in many sectors and there are lots of things to do for the two sides. The two countries could enhance financial and trade cooperation,” Chen said, listing sectors like currency swaps, stock market interconnections and third-party market development.
Bilateral trade has picked up in the past two years after a long decline, but the current level of trade is still below the peak, Zhang Jifeng, vice director of the Institute of Japanese Studies at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times.
Japan was the fourth-largest trade partner of China in the first seven months of 2019. The total trade volume of the two countries increased 1 percent to 1.21 trillion yuan ($171.7 billion), accounting for 6.9 percent of China’s total foreign trade, the Xinhua News Agency reported.
Yearly trade between China and Japan has the potential to reach $500 billion, if the two countries can implement the consensus reached by their leaders and economic cooperation can be enhanced, Zhang said.
An improving China-Japan relationship will greatly benefit both sides, and closer economic cooperation with China can provide Japan with a strong driver for economic growth, Zhang said.
Japan should cherish the hardwon good relationship with China and make concrete efforts to improve bilateral ties, Zhang added.