By Shannon Tiezzi
Leaders from China, Japan, and South Korea avoided touching on divisive issues in favor of sending a positive message.
After months of anticipation, China, Japan, and South Korea held their first trilateral summit since 2012 this weekend. Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe traveled to Seoul to meet with South Korean President Park Geun-hye on November 1. The three leaders issued a Joint Declaration for Peace and Cooperation in Northeast Asia after their meeting on Sunday (full text available here from Yonhap News Agency).
The declaration took an optimistic view of the thorny relationship between China, Japan, and South Korea. Saying that “steady progress has been made in trilateral cooperation in various areas despite fluid situations in the Northeast Asian region in recent years,” the statement declares that “trilateral cooperation has been completely restored on the occasion of this Summit.” From now on, the trilateral summit “is to be held on a regular basis,” according to the declaration. Such summits were held annually from 2008 to 2012; should a trilateral summit take place again next year, Japan is set to be the host.
Despite the optimism, most of the 2015 declaration sticks to low-hanging fruit such as disaster management, environmental issues, people-to-people exchanges, and deepening economic ties. The declaration included 18 points on “expanding economic and social cooperation for co-prosperity,” 10 on “promoting sustainable development,” and 14 on “enhancing trust and understanding among the peoples.” There were only eight points dealing with security and political issues, and most of those were simply promises of trilateral coordination prior to upcoming multilateral meetings.
Read the full story at The Diplomat