SEOUL,
May 27 (Reuters) - Chinese Premier Li Qiang praised what he called a
restart in relations with Japan and South Korea as he met their leaders
for the first three-way talks in four years on Monday, agreeing to revive trade and security dialogues hampered by global tensions.
The
Chinese premier met with South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol and
Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida in Seoul with efforts to
revitalise three-party free trade agreement negotiations, stalled since
2019, high on the agenda.
As
the summit opened, Li said the meeting was "both a restart and a new
beginning" and called for the comprehensive resumption of cooperation
between East Asia's economic powerhouses.
But
for this to happen politics should be separated from economic and trade
issues, he added, calling for an end to protectionism and the
decoupling of supply chains.
"For
China, South Korea, and Japan, our close ties will not change, the
spirit of cooperation achieved through crisis response will not change
and our mission to safeguard regional peace and stability will not
change," Li said.
Regardless of agreements signed during the talks, the meeting itself is being seen as a mark of progress in relations between three countries whose relations are marked as much by suspicion and rancour as constructive engagement.
"The
China-Japan-South Korea trilateral summit is more about reducing
frictions than reshaping geopolitics," said Leif-Eric Easley, a
professor at Ewha University in Seoul.
China
and U.S.-allied South Korea and Japan are trying to manage mutual
distrust amid the rivalry between Beijing and Washington, tensions over
democratically ruled Taiwan, which China claims as its own, and North
Korea's nuclear programme.
Yoon
and Kishida have charted a closer course with each other and to
Washington, embarking on unprecedented three-way cooperation with the
United States on military and other measures.
U.S. President Joe Biden has raised barriers to Chinese imports,
hiking tariffs on an array of Chinese imports including electric
vehicle (EV) batteries and computer chips. Donald Trump, his rival in
the November presidential election, has floated tariffs of 60% or higher
on all Chinese goods.
AREAS OF AGREEMENT
A
joint declaration released after the meeting called for China, Japan,
and South Korea to formalise more regular communication at the highest
levels, and collaborate on climate change, conservation, health, trade
and international peace, among other areas.
The
declaration also set a goal of boosting the number of people-to-people
exchanges to 40 million by 2030 through exchanges in culture, tourism
and education.