Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida expressed enthusiasm Tuesday for Japan hosting a trilateral summit with South Korea and China this year ahead of a meeting that brought together his counterparts from the two Asian neighbors and Southeast Asia.
"Japan would like to first host a foreign ministers' meeting between Japan, China and South Korea and have that meeting's outcome lead to a summit" of the three countries' leaders, Kishida said in opening remarks at a meeting of the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations plus the three countries in the Laotian capital of Vientiane.
"The cooperation of Japan, China and South Korea has completely been normalized," Kishida said at the annual ASEAN-plus-three meeting, which serves as a rare chance for the foreign ministers of the three countries to get meet.