Japan's Abe seeks Obama's support in dispute with China
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe hopes a meeting with US President Barack Obama will breathe new life into a key alliance at a time of heightened tensions across Asia
When Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe meets US President Barack Obama this week for the first time since taking power, he will seek to breathe new life into a key alliance at a time of heightened tensions across Asia.
Abe will be keen to get the reassurance of strong US support during a visit to Washington that comes amid an escalating row with China over disputed islands, and in the same month that North Korea carried out its third nuclear test.
While Abe is the fifth Japanese prime minister that Obama will have met as US president, he has struck a starkly different tone to his predecessors, pledging to make the alliance his top foreign-policy priority.
In an interview with before the trip, Abe said a tighter alliance with the United States would send a message to Beijing in a tense row over the East China Sea islands.
"It is important for us to have [China} recognise that it is impossible to try to get their way by coercion or intimidation," Abe said. "In that regard, the Japan-US alliance, as well as the US presence, would be critical."
It is important for us to have [China} recognise that it is impossible to try to get their way by coercion
Territorial tensions rose sharply in September when Tokyo nationalised some of the disputed island chain - known as the Diaoyus in China and the Senkakus in Japan - setting off huge protests across China and a consumer boycott of Japanese brands that hurt exporters as Abe's government strives to stoke growth in the world's third-largest economy.
