TOKYO, Oct 31: Japanese experts called on Monday on Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to step up aid to China and encourage joint studies on sensitive history issues so as not to leave Japan `isolated’ in Asia.

A group of 78 prominent academics, business leaders, lawmakers and journalists called on the new premier to distance himself from hardliners who believe China's rise is a threat.

“If Japan continues to regard any growing trend toward cooperation and (Asian) integration with suspicion, it must be prepared to find itself isolated from the rest of Asia,” they wrote in an unofficial study presented to Abe.

“Japan is not so weak that it would be pulled in any direction a rising China might want. People harbouring such suspicions or fears do not have a high enough estimation of their own country,” said the group, known as the Policy Council of the Japan Forum on International Relations.

Mr Abe on Oct 8 paid a groundbreaking visit to China, which both sides hailed as a fresh start after years of tension under Japan's former prime minister Junichiro Koizumi.

Mr Koizumi infuriated China by repeatedly visiting a war shrine linked to Japan's militarist past. Japan, in turn, took a harder line after China blocked its bid for a permanent seat on the UN Security Council.

Koizumi's government decided to halt low-interest loans to China before the 2008 Beijing Olympics, which is set to symbolize the country's rapid growth.

The loans, totalling three trillion yen (25 billion dollars), have been the main form of Japanese assistance since the two countries normalized ties in 1972 and are widely seen as de facto reparation for war damage.

But the policy paper said Japan should step up other forms of aid, namely grants from the Japanese embassy and consulates to support medical care, education and other development in poorer parts of China.

“Japan's grassroots program for China should be expanded, not just continued,” it said.

The group, which was formed in 1987 to make studies and recommendations about Japan's role in the international community, also called for more regular summits and other dialogue between Asia's two largest economies.

It hoped Japan and China would carry out promises to jointly study history.

While the two countries are bound to disagree on issues, such research “has the possibility of resulting in a shared agreement on the historical facts, or at least a mutual understanding of the different interpretations,” it said.—Reuters