Lee to Hold Summit With Aso in Beijing
By Kang Hyun-kyung
Staff Reporter
President Lee Myung-bak will hold a summit with Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso during the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) from Oct. 24 to 25 in Beijing, said a government source.
The summit will mark the first top-level meeting since Aso took office on Sept. 24.
``Recently Tokyo told Seoul that the new Japanese prime minister wanted to meet Lee sometime during the ASEM. Seoul accepted the offer because it is not desirable for the ongoing sour bilateral diplomatic relations to continue,'' said a source.
President Lee and former Prime Minister Fukuda had three summits. Fukuda retired in September after mounting pressure shaped by a hostile political landscape featuring opposition parties controlling Japan's upper house and a worsening economy.
Seoul-Tokyo relations hit bottom after Tokyo's description of the Dokdo islets as its territory in middle school textbook material in July.
Before the feud over the territory issue, bilateral relations showed signs of improvement after self-proclaimed pragmatist Lee took office in February.
Lee reiterated his willingness to seek a forward-looking relationship with Japan before the territory issue resurfaced, and his then counterpart Fukuda hailed Lee's posture.
In the upcoming summit, Lee reportedly plans to discuss major regional economic and security issues such as the global financial crisis and the six-party talks where the two sides can easily find common ground, while avoiding sensitive matters such as the textbooks.
Earlier, Lee called for holding tripartite Seoul-Tokyo-Beijing summit to discuss ways to better protect the regional market from the negative fallout of the Wall Street financial crisis.
The summit takes place after U.S. President George W. Bush took North Korea off a list of states sponsoring terrorism.
``Although Lee and Aso are not going to touch the territory issue, Seoul will continue to stand firm on Dokdo separate from restoring Seoul-Tokyo relations,'' said the source.