Former top career diplomat Koreshige Anami believes relations between Japan and China are very important but equally tenuous.
Anami, who capped his long foreign service career as ambassador to China, became executive director of the Japan Foundation China Center on July 1 to be responsible for interaction projects among young people of the two neighboring countries.
"Sino-Japanese relations are very important but at the same time are very unstable," said the 68-year-old, who was posted to Beijing from 2001 to 2006. "We would like to establish firm ties at the people's level."