Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga became the first foreign leader to be welcomed by President Joe Biden on Friday, and that alone is an unusual sign. And at the moment, Japan-China relations are slipping sharply, Xi Jinping’s plans to visit Japan have long been unsettled, and the Chinese and Japanese foreign ministers are sparring over a number of issues, with China warning Japan not to stretch its hands too far and follow the U.S., while Japan is breaking with caution and publicly attacking China’s human rights and South China Sea expansion.
What will the U.S.-Japan summit talk about? AFP analysis, the China issue is the overriding issue. Kan hopes to further strengthen the bilateral relationship, which has been solid since the Trump era, and to coordinate their positions to deal more effectively with an increasingly aggressive China in the international arena.
The 2+2 meeting between U.S. Secretary of State Blinken and Defense Secretary Austin and Japan on the eve of the U.S.-China Alaska Dialogue set the tone for the summit, and like the four-nation alliance video summit held earlier, the message was unusually clear: the allies would form a united front to deal with Beijing at a time of frequent Chinese military actions at sea, the destruction of one-country, two-systems in Hong Kong by Beijing and a massive crackdown in Xinjiang.
The outcome of that 2+2 meeting was not fully anticipated by Beijing, as Japan publicly and harshly accused Beijing of military actions in the East and South China Seas. The exasperated Beijing authorities, through spokesman Zhao Lijian, denounced Japan for being in cahoots with the United States, accusing Japan of “acting as a strategic vassal of the United States” and “going out of its way to lure wolves into its home,” among other things.
Before Kan prepared to leave for the United States, the Japanese and Chinese foreign ministers held another call at the request of the Chinese side, in which Japanese Foreign Minister Toshichika Mogi not only expressed serious concern over “repeated incursions by Chinese maritime police vessels into the territorial waters around the Senkaku Islands and the South China Sea” and strongly demanded that the Chinese side take concrete measures to solve the problem, but also expressed a rare strong concern over human rights issues in Xinjiang and Hong Kong. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi accused Japan, as an “independent country”, of not being “led by some countries that are biased against China”. The Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman threatened the Japanese side to “not extend its hand too far”, and it was clear that the atmosphere of the call was tense and unyielding.
China’s efforts to advise Japan to remain “independent” and not to be “paced” by the United States are hardly effective. It was against this background that Kan prepared for his trip to the United States. In Tokyo, Biden took the Japanese prime minister’s invitation to the White House as the first foreign leader to visit the White House since he took office as a sign that “the United States has given East Asian diplomacy a very high priority. According to Miyagiya Kunihiko, an adviser to Kan, this means that the U.S. is sharing Japan’s concerns about the dramatic changes in the East Asian environment over the past decade.
Japan has always been cautious on the Taiwan issue, but in a joint statement issued after the last 2+2 talks, Japan made clear its concern about the “importance of peace and stability” in the Taiwan Strait. Kyodo News reported on March 21 that the meeting also confirmed that Japan and the U.S. would work closely together in the event of an emergency in Taiwan, which, if true, would be a major change for Japan on the Taiwan issue. According to the Financial Times, Biden may push the Japanese side to make a clear statement on how Japan would act in case China attacks Taiwan, but it is generally believed that this would put Japan in a difficult position, and if the Japanese side is very clear on the Taiwan issue after the summit, it would mean a break in Japan’s usual strategy of maintaining equidistant diplomacy between the U.S. and China as much as possible.
AFP analyzed that the joint statement issued by Biden and Kan after the meeting should reaffirm the obligations of both sides to the security of the Senkaku Islands, which China calls the Diaoyu Islands. The two sides may also emphasize that “peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait are extremely important”. But Japan’s position on China’s human rights is likely to be relatively cautious, according to Kyokoji Yanagisawa, director of the Japan Institute of International Geopolitics. Because “the impact of the increasingly frequent confrontation between the U.S. and China on China’s neighbor, Japan, will be prominent in terms of national security and economy.
China and the United States are Japan’s first and second largest partners, respectively, which is why Japan has done its best to improve diplomatic relations with Beijing over the years. However, the diplomacy facing both China and the U.S. at sea is now very different.
According to Japanese public opinion analysis, Kan should join Biden in expressing serious concerns about human rights issues in China, but Japan is unlikely to call for a boycott of Beijing on related issues.
While Biden and Kan may differ on the scale of their attacks on China’s human rights, they agree on other areas such as climate issues and ensuring a regular supply of semiconductors. The two leaders plan to reach an agreement to overcome the current shortage of certain electronic components and to avoid a Chinese monopoly on semiconductor production.
The U.S. and South Korea both announced later Thursday that Biden will meet South Korean President Moon Jae-in at the White House in May. A White House spokesman said the discussion will focus on the North Korean nuclear issue and peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific region. Moon will be the second foreign leader to visit the White House after Kan.
Recent Comments