China shoots down proposed Japan summit

BEIJING: China has ruled out the possibility of a proposed summit with Japan after Tokyo aimed at defusing an increasingly bitter territorial row, the official China Daily newspaper reported yesterday.

The report, quoting a statement by an unidentified Chinese official on Monday, coincided with a visit to Beijing by Japanese Vice-Foreign Minister Akitaka Saiki.

Mr Saiki’s visit is the latest effort by Tokyo to improve ties soured by the row over tiny, uninhabited islands in the East China Sea claimed by both countries.

Chinese and Japanese officials were tight-lipped about who Mr Saiki would meet in Beijing.

Hawkish Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who cemented his grip on power in an upper house election last week, has been signalling a desire for dialogue with China — although he has also rejected any conditions set by Beijing.

At the same time, Japan has raised its assessment of the risk of China’s military buildup and maritime assertiveness.

The unidentified Chinese official urged Japan to take concrete measures to improve strained ties rather than ‘‘empty slogans’’, the China Daily reported.

In Tokyo, a Japanese Foreign Ministry source said he had not seen the China Daily report, but a summit could still be held at the right time.

‘‘It is true no concrete date is set for a leaders’ summit or foreign ministers’ summit,’’ the Japanese source said. ‘‘But this does not mean there will never be one.’’

The China Daily also said statements by Abe adviser Isao Iijima that a summit between Mr Abe and Chinese President Xi Jinping could occur in the ‘‘not-toodistant future’’ were misleading.

Mr Iijima’s statements were based on conversations with Chinese officials in Beijing in mid-July.

China Daily quoted the Chinese official as saying: ‘‘What Iijima told reporters on Sunday is not true and is fabricated, based on the needs of Japan’s domestic politics.’’

Often fragile Sino-Japanese ties have been further strained since September, when the territorial row over the East China Sea islands flared following the nationalisation of the islands by Mr Abe’s predecessor Yoshihiko Noda in September.

Concern that Mr Abe, who came to power in December, wants to recast Japan’s wartime history with a less apologetic tone added to the tension. Critics have also accused the Chinese Communist Party of manipulating domestic opinion through anti-Japanese propaganda.

Experts in Japan say both sides, as well as Tokyo’s security ally the United States, would like to calm the tension to avoid any clashes near the islands.

Mr Abe may also be hoping to repeat one of the few successes of his troubled 2006-2007 term, when he thawed ties with China that had frayed during the preceding five-year stint of Junichiro Koizumi.

Analysts said, however, that Mr Abe may have been overconfident about prospects for talks following his ruling bloc’s big win in the July 21 upper house election. The victory ended a parliamentary deadlock and set the stage for Japan’s first long-term government since Mr Koizumi’s 2001-2006 tenure.

‘‘I think the Abe government got confident, thinking that now they have a secure majority, China should know Abe is here for the long term and they have to deal with him,’’ Sophia University professor Koichi Nakano said.

Experts say the main sticking point to a Sino-Japanese summit is whether the two sides can find a way to set aside the row and focus on other aspects of relations between the world’s second- and thirdlargest economies.

China wants Japan first to acknowledge a formal dispute exists, a step Tokyo has rejected for fear it would undermine its claim to sovereignty of the isles, the experts said.