SAN FRANCISCO: Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said on Thursday that he told President Xi Jinping he has “serious concerns” about Chinese military activity during their first direct talks in a year and slammed Beijing’s ban on its seafood.

Kishida said he “expressed our serious concerns over China’s increasing military activity near Japan, including its collaboration with Russia” during their meeting on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum.

“At the same time, I re-emphasised the extreme importance of the Taiwan Strait’s peace and stability to the international community, including Japan,” Kishida told Japanese television channels after the talks in the United States.

“On the East China Sea, I expressed once again our serious concerns and urged the immediate removal of (Chinese) buoys set up in Japan’s EEZ,” Kishida said, referring to the country’s exclusive economic zone.

Chinese state media reported that Xi told Kishida in the meeting in San Francisco that Japan and China must “follow the trend of the times, focus on common interests (and) properly handle differences”.

The Chinese leader said the two nations must “commit themselves to building a Sino-Japanese relationship that meets the requirements of the new era”.

`Calm response’

On the seafood ban, Kishida said he “strongly demanded a calm response based on scientific evidence and the immediate removal of restrictions on imports of Japanese food products”.

He also said the two sides “agreed to seek solutions through dialogue and discussions based on constructive attitude”.

China banned all Japanese seafood imports after Tokyo began releasing treated wastewater into the Pacific Ocean from the stricken Fukushima nuclear plant in August, with Beijing accusing Tokyo of treating the sea like a “sewer”.

Japan insists the discharge is safe, a view backed by the Internatio­nal Atomic Energy Agency.

But Xi reiterated complaints about the wastewater release during his talks with Kishida on Thursday, Beijing said.

“The release of contaminated water from Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant concerns the health of all mankind, the global marine environment and the international public interest,” Xi said, according to the Chinese foreign ministry.

Xi “also called on Japan to take seriously the legitimate concerns at home and abroad on the issue”, state news agency Xinhua said.

Kishida also said he once again called for the early release of Japanese citizens detained in China.

Seventeen Japanese people have been detained by Chinese authorities since China’s amended anti-espionage law went into effect in 2015.

The Japanese embassy confirmed last month that one of its citizens — an employee of the Japanese pharmaceutical company Astellas — had been formally arrested, months after Beijing said it had detained the man on spying charges.

Published in Dawn, November 18th, 2023