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The first-ever summit talks with Korea, China and Japan will take place in Japan in September and the three neighboring countries will hold regular foreign ministers’ meetings.

During a meeting in Tokyo on June 14, Korean Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan and his Chinese and Japanese counterparts, Yang Jeichi and Masahiko Komura, agreed to the three nation summit.

In a press conference held after the meeting, Komura remarked that the three countries agreed to open a three-nation summit in Japan around September and to hold regular foreign ministers’ talks, adding that the next talks will be hosted by China.

An official of the Foreign Ministry in Seoul spoke, “The regularization of three-way foreign ministers’ talks is meaningful in that the three nations will institutionalize cooperation in Northeast Asia, which has been hindered by the history issue.” Foreign ministers from the three nations have met during multilateral diplomatic events, such as Asean+3(Korea, China, Japan) meetings. However, they first met on Jeju Island in June last year after Seoul proposed a meeting stressing the necessity of separate talks to strengthen cooperation. This was the second time for the three foreign minister to meet.

During the Tokyo meeting, they agreed to expanding the frame of cooperation among the three countries in case of disasters, including the recent earthquakes in China’s Sizhuan Province and Japan’s Miyagi Prefecture. Regarding the issue of providing economic support for Africa, they will discuss a way for the three countries to take concerted actions. China and Japan have been competing in this matter to develop natural resources in Africa.

During bilateral foreign ministers’ talks with Japan, Yu urged Tokyo to be prudent with respect to Japan’s plan to describe Dokdo as its territory in a new guidebook.

Foreign ministers of Korea, China and Japan have thought that there was a little progress in the recent working-group meeting aimed at normalizing ties between Pyongyang and Tokyo and agreed to resume the six-party talks in June, according to the sources.

Please direct questions or comments to [englishhani@hani.co.kr]