Sunday Times 2
Obama, Japan PM firm on N.Korea, cautious on China
View(s):WASHINGTON (AFP) -US President Barack Obama pledged with Japan’s new leader to take a firm line on a defiant North Korea but the two sides also tried to calm rising tensions between Tokyo and China.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe carefully avoided disagreements with Obama after previous Japanese governments’ rifts and declared: “The alliance between Japan and the United States is back now. It’s completely back.”Obama promised to work closely with the conservative leader, whose Liberal Democratic Party swept back into power in December on a platform that includes boosting defense spending and aggressively stimulating a long-flaccid economy.
“You can rest assured that you will have a strong partner in the United States throughout your tenure,” Obama told Abe in the Oval Office, calling the alliance with Japan “the central foundation” for US policy in Asia.
Obama said the two leaders discussed “our concerns about the provocative actions that have been taken by North Korea and our determination to take strong actions in response.” North Korea carried out its third nuclear test on February 12, ignoring warnings even from its ally China.
Abe, who first rose to political prominence as an advocate for a tough line on North Korea, said he agreed with Obama’s position of not offering “rewards” to Pyongyang and on the need for a new UN Security Council resolution.
But the White House appeared to want to lower the temperature between Japan and China, which has increasingly sent vessels near Japanese-controlled islands known as the Senkaku in Japanese and Diaoyu in Chinese.
Obama did not mention the issue but Secretary of State John Kerry, in a separate meeting with Japan’s Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida, said he wanted to “compliment Japan on the restraint it has shown.” The meetings came hours after Beijing lashed out at Abe over a newspaper interview in which he charged that China would eventually hurt its investment climate through assertive actions in the region.
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