U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will visit Japan in early July for talks with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe following his trip to North Korea, a Japanese government source said Friday.
The two governments are arranging a stopover for Pompeo in Japan possibly on July 7 and 8, during which he is also expected to meet with Foreign Minister Taro Kono, according to the source.
The Japanese government wants to be briefed on Pompeo's talks with North Korean officials, scheduled next week, and confirm bilateral cooperation to settle the issue of Japanese nationals abducted by the North's agents in the 1970s and 1980s.
Kono told reporters on Wednesday during his visit to Bangkok that he would like to hold talks with Pompeo "in the near future."
Pompeo will visit Pyongyang next week for talks with the North over denuclearization, the Financial Times reported Thursday. It will be the first high-level meeting between the two countries since U.S. President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un held a summit in Singapore on June 12.
Kono was planning to make a tour of Europe, including trips to Austria and Georgia, but will likely review his schedule to accommodate plans to meet Pompeo here, the source added.