Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Sunday held a meeting in Vietnam with a Taiwanese politician, hours after Chinese President Xi Jinping warned him not to break
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Sunday held a meeting in Vietnam with a Taiwanese politician, hours after Chinese President Xi Jinping warned him not to break with past consensus on what Beijing regards as a renegade province.
Abe held a 30-minute meeting with James Soong, head of the People First Party, on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Danang, Vietnam, according to the Foreign Ministry in Tokyo.
After meeting with Soong, Abe left Vietnam and flew to Manila later in the day, where he was scheduled to meet Indonesian President Joko “Jokowi” Widodo and Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak.
The meeting with Soong risks creating a backlash from China even as Abe says he wants deeper cooperation on the threat posed by North Korea. In a summit with Xi on Saturday night, Abe received no clear response to a proposal that he visit China next year to mark the 40th anniversary of a friendship treaty.
Ties between China and Japan are less hostile than when Abe took office five years ago amid anger over a worsening territorial dispute.
