By Clint Richards
Despite a cordial APEC meeting, Putin and Abe cannot afford to make real progress.
While we here at The Diplomat have been giving extensive coverage to the ongoing APEC Summit, and particularly the brief meeting between President Xi Jinping and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Japan has managed to significantly engage another Asian ally: Russia. Abe met with President Vladimir Putin on Sunday, in what was by all accounts a much friendlier and more productive exchange. The two leaders continued to walk a fine line between improving their ties without upsetting their domestic populations (Russia) or allies (Japan), during cordial talks that ran to twice their allotted time of 45 minutes.
One important item on their agenda was a rescheduling of Putin’s visit to Tokyo. The president had been set to come this fall, but the ongoing conflict in Ukraine made Japan call off the meeting in order not to upset its G7 allies, particularly the U.S. While an official date has not been set, the Yomiuri Shimbun reported that the leaders “have agreed that both countries will make preparations for Putin’s visit to Japan at an appropriate time next year.”
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