Senior trade officials from Japan and China agreed here Wednesday on the need to negotiate a resolution to the escalating trade spat.
The trade talks between Hideaki Omura, parliamentary secretary from the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, and Zhang Zhigang, deputy minister of China's State Economic and Trade Commission, were the first since Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi's controversial visit to Tokyo's Yasukuni Shrine.
Diplomatic relations between the two countries have been strained since Koizumi ignored protests from China and paid tribute to war dead at the shrine on Aug. 13.
Omura stressed to Zhang the need for negotiators to discuss Beijing's ruling that Japanese steelmakers were guilty of dumping steel in China and Japan's emergency "safeguard" curbs imposed on imports from China, according to Japanese sources.
Zhang stressed the need to take a broader perspective in settling outstanding trade issues, adding he hopes reopened government-private sector talks on steel dumping will move in a favorable direction.
The dispute stems from Japan's decision in April to impose import curbs on shiitake mushrooms, leeks and rushes. China, which accounts for the bulk of Japan's imports of the three, retaliated in June with tariffs on Japan-made cars, cellphones and washing machines.
Omura is in Shanghai to attend the two-day Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum to support small and midsize enterprises, which opened Wednesday.