Tokyo: The top diplomats of South Korea, Japan, and China were set to hold talks in Tokyo on Saturday, focusing on strengthening trilateral cooperation as they eye a leaders' summit later this year, Seoul officials said. The talks will be held between South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Tae-yul, Japanese Foreign Minister Takeshi Iwaya, and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi.
According to Yonhap News Agency, they are expected to broadly discuss efforts to advance the tripartite partnership in economy, culture, and people-to-people exchanges, as well as regional and global issues, including those related to the Korean Peninsula, officials said. The three ministers are scheduled to hold a joint press conference following the talks. Cho will join Iwaya for separate bilateral talks on the same day.
Cho arrived in Japan the previous day and met one-on-one with Wang. At Saturday's talks, the three sides are expected to coordinate efforts to facilitate a successful summit of the countries' leaders. Japan is the host for this year's gathering, widely expected to take place later this year.
In a press availability ahead of the talks earlier this week, Iwaya said that he plans to have candid exchanges with his counterparts of views and discussions on trilateral cooperation and the regional situation to promote forward-looking cooperation. With Iwaya, Cho is expected to discuss preparations for the 60th anniversary of the normalization of the two countries' diplomatic ties, set for June this year, among other pending bilateral issues.
A key point of attention will be how Japan plans to hold a memorial ceremony this year for victims of wartime forced labor at its UNESCO-listed Sado mines, where many Koreans were forced to toil during World War II. South Korea boycotted last year's memorial event in protest of Tokyo's lack of effort to properly honor the victims.
The three Asian neighbors held their last foreign ministers' dialogue in South Korea's southern city of Busan in November 2023, attended by Wang and then Foreign Ministers Park Jin and Yoko Kamikawa. The previous three-way summit took place in Seoul in May last year between President Yoon Suk Yeol, then Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, and Chinese Premier Li Qiang.