Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said Tuesday U.S. President Donald Trump has pledged to raise the issue of Japanese nationals abducted by Pyongyang decades ago during his summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un expected by early June.

In a meeting at Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida, Abe and Trump agreed to maintain "maximum pressure" on North Korea until it takes concrete steps toward "complete, verifiable and irreversible denuclearization," Japanese Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasutoshi Nishimura said.

Appearing before the cameras between the leaders' two rounds of talks in Florida on the first day of their two-day summit, Abe expressed gratitude for Trump's "understanding that Japan has put emphasis on the abduction issue" and for his "promise to take it up" in the first-ever U.S.-North Korea summit.

Nishimura, who attended the meeting and then briefed reporters, quoted Trump as telling Abe the United States "will do its best for Japan" over the North Korean issues as a whole.

"We will bring up the abductees. We'll bring up many different things. I think it's a time for talking, it's a time for solving problems. I know that's been a very big factor for you," Trump said in the meeting, part of which was open to the media.

(Japan PM Shinzo Abe, left, and U.S. President Donald Trump)

Noting that Washington has been engaged in direct talks at "extremely high levels" with Pyongyang in preparation for the summit, the president said, "I look forward to meeting with Kim Jong Un. And hopefully, that will be a success. And maybe it will be, and maybe it won't be. We don't know. But we'll see what happens."

The Japanese leader has maintained that the abduction issue is one of his government's top priorities. Tokyo officially lists 17 of its citizens as having been abducted by North Korea in the 1970s and 1980s.

Five of the 17 were returned to Japan in 2002, following then Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's meeting with Kim's late father Kim Jong Il, but North Korea insists eight have died and the other four never entered its territory.

Among other topics, Abe and Trump also touched on recent U.S-led airstrikes on Syria following an alleged chemical weapons attack on its citizens, Nishimura said, adding Abe communicated Japan's support for the "resolve" of the United States, Britain and France not to forgive the proliferation and use of chemical weapons.

The summit between Abe and Trump comes after Washington surprised Tokyo with Trump's decision to meet Kim, a development announced last month by a South Korean official, as well as the president's recent decision not to exempt Japan from steel and aluminum import duties.

Japan has been somewhat sidelined amid the flurry of diplomacy over North Korea's nuclear program, including a meeting between Kim and Chinese President Xi Jinping late last month, scheduled talks between Kim and South Korean President Moon Jae In on April 27, as well as the planned meeting between Kim and Trump.

Speculation has risen that Trump may push Abe to make economic concessions, such as agreeing to start negotiations for a bilateral free trade agreement, in return for pressing Pyongyang to resolve the abduction issue and abandon its medium-range missiles capable of hitting Japan.

Asked whether the two leaders talked about trade and the economy, Nishimura declined to give details as they will meet again the following day.


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While official remarks laud the close ties between the two leaders, experts on the Japan-U.S. alliance point to an apparent rift between them, in particular on trade.

Abe is believed to have demanded that the United States exempt Japan from the tariffs on steel and aluminum imports, especially as most major U.S. allies have been extended such treatment.

Trump's decision to impose tariffs on Japan is seen as levying pressure to prod it into a bilateral free trade deal as a means to reduce the U.S. deficit with the country through increased exports.

Japan has expressed reluctance about a free trade deal with the United States, given Tokyo's preference to promote the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a regional free trade agreement from which Washington withdrew soon after Trump's inauguration in January last year.

On Tuesday evening, Trump reiterated a call for a bilateral trade deal with Japan, saying he believes bilateral deals are "far more efficient" than multilateral arrangements like the TPP.

"Too many contingencies and no way to get out if it doesn't work. Bilateral deals are far more efficient, profitable and better for OUR workers," he tweeted.

The tweet came after Trump appeared to soften his stance on the TPP last week. He tweeted the United States would join the TPP, now with 11 members, if it offered "substantially better" terms.

Given Trump's talk of rejoining the TPP, Abe has prepared to propose a new framework to discuss trade issues with the United States as a way of coaxing it back to the TPP, according to Japanese government sources.

In a major policy shift, Trump directed Larry Kudlow, director of the National Economic Council, and U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer last Thursday to look into rejoining the TPP, as the United States is embroiled in a simmering trade dispute with China, a non-TPP country.

Aside from formal talks, dinners and a working lunch, Abe and Trump will play golf together to "further strengthen a relationship of trust between the two leaders," according to Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga.