Japan, China and South Korea have failed for the third straight year to hold an annual summit, Japanese government sources said Wednesday, despite an agreement that their leaders gather for talks every year.

Among the factors behind the trilateral dialogue framework's effective malfunction are soured Tokyo-Seoul ties over a long-standing wartime labor issue and Beijing's intensifying military activities in the East China Sea, according to the sources.

The last meeting of leaders from the three East Asian nations was held in December 2019 in the southwestern Chinese city of Chengdu.

File photo shows (From R) Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and South Korean President Moon Jae In at the end of their joint press conference following their talks in Chengdu in China's Sichuan Province on Dec. 24, 2019. (Kyodo)

At their first trilateral summit in 2008, the three countries agreed to hold leaders' talks annually and to take turns acting as host, while pledging to step up cooperation in various fields such as international finance, the economy and disaster response.

The next gathering is set to be held under South Korea's presidency, but it did not take place in 2020 and 2021, due to the coronavirus pandemic and rocky relations between Japan and South Korea, which was under the government of left-leaning President Moon Jae In, the sources said.

With Yoon Suk Yeol replacing Moon in May with a pledge to improve relations with Japan, the bilateral ties have begun to show a sign of improvement.

However, the two countries remain apart following South Korean court rulings, issued under the Moon presidency, to liquidate local assets seized from two Japanese companies, which refused to pay compensation over their alleged use of forced labor during Japan's 1910-1945 colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Yoon met in mid-November in Cambodia, vowing to work toward an "early settlement" of the wartime labor problem.

It was the first official in-person summit between the two nations in almost three years.

But a Japanese Foreign Ministry official said that it is difficult "for the time being" for the two leaders to visit each other's nation as the labor issue is unlikely to be solved.

Tokyo and Seoul have been discussing plans for a fund to be established by South Korean firms that would be used to pay compensation to wartime labor plaintiffs on behalf of Japanese corporate defendants, the sources said.

Japan also has matters of concern with China, such as their spat over the Senkaku Islands, a group of Tokyo-controlled islets in the East China Sea, which Beijing claims and calls Diaoyu.

Chinese coast guard vessels have repeatedly entered Japan's territorial waters around the uninhabited islets in an attempt to undermine Tokyo control over them.

In addition, tensions between the United States, Japan's security ally, and China have increased over the Taiwan Strait, especially after a trip to Taipei by U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi in August.

Beijing carried out large-scale military drills near Taiwan in retaliation, including the launch of ballistic missiles, some of which fell into Japan's exclusive economic zone east of the island, which China regards as a breakaway province.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has not ruled out the use of force to bring the island under its control.

Kishida and Xi met in Bangkok last month, the first face-to-face meeting by leaders of the two Asian powers since 2019, and agreed on a trip to China by Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi.

However, "it will take time until the next high-level talks can be realized" a Japanese government source said.


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