Japan, China and South Korea brought their increasingly discordant relationship to Southeast Asia today by arguing over who
said what when at an impromptu
meeting of their
leaders on the sidelines of an ASEAN summit.
A formal meeting of the three leaders held every year on the occasion of the ASEAN summit was not scheduled this year because of tensions over Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's visits to a Tokyo shrine that honours some convicted war criminals along with Japan's 2.5 million war dead.
The three sides gave diverging accounts of an encounter today, with South Korean officials saying President Roh Moo-hyun had talked only to Koizumi, while Chinese officials said both the Chinese and South Korean leaders spoke to him.
''It was a chance encounter,'' South Korean presidential spokeswoman Mira Sun said, adding, ''It was not a meeting.'' Japanese officials originally said a ''friendly'' chat among the three lasted for about 10 minutes as they waited for lunch with members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), with whom the three are dialogue partners.
But they later conceded that Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao did not say much.
''Wen basically was listening throughout. I don't think he really made any remarks, at least nothing substantial,'' a Japanese official said.
Speaking to reporters in Kuala Lumpur, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao said of the encounter: ''The two leaders urged the Japanese leader to take the right approach towards the issue of history and to create favourable conditions and atmosphere for the trilateral cooperation''.
On hearing this version of events by late this evening, a Japanese foreign ministry spokesman, Akira Chiba, retorted: ''This is not a fact and we want to ask the Chinese foreign ministry why they told the press something other than the fact.'' The three leaders sat together at lunch, with Koizumi seated between Wen and Roh.
SWIPE AT CHINA South Korea and China have demanded Koizumi stop his annual visits to the Yasukuni shrine. The Japanese leader has refused, criticising them for using the issue as a diplomatic card.
Koizumi, who came into power in April 2001, last went to the shrine in October. He says his visits are to pray for peace and honour the war dead.
Apart from the trilateral meeting, both Beijing and Seoul have given him the cold shoulder, saying their leaders would not hold separate talks with him during the Kuala Lumpur gathering.
Wen told reporters in Kuala Lumpur that China had not wanted to see the meeting delayed, and blamed Japan.
''The main reason is because Japanese leaders won't own up to history,'' he said, repeating oft-made comments.
''The Japanese invasion of China was a very painful disaster...
Despite this China and Japan are neighbours. The long term development of relations between the two countries is in the interests of the people of those countries. The main problem is Japanese leaders are going against the tide of history.'' Even though Koizumi's shrine visits have frayed relations with China and South Korea, it has done him little harm at home and may even be winning him some points with the Japanese public.
Analysts say his rejection of demands to stop visiting Yasukuni strikes a chord with the many Japanese who resent China's economic rise and are suspicious of its military buildup.