China's official Xinhua news agency on Monday poured cold water on the idea that Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and President Xi Jinping could have formal talks on the sidelines of next week's Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit.

Expectations have been growing in Japan that the two men would meet for an ice-breaking chat at the gathering of Asia-Pacific leaders.

A meeting of the two leaders would be a symbolic breakthrough in ties between the world's second- and third-biggest economies, which have turned frigid in the past two years over the Senkaku Islands row, regional rivalry and the bitter legacy of Japan's wartime occupation of China.