Leaders of more than 70 countries, including Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Chinese President Xi Jinping, gather in Jakarta on Wednesday and Thursday this week to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the Bandung Conference, the first meeting of leaders of Asian and African countries that won independence after World War II, liberating themselves from Western colonialism. The spirit of the 10-point declaration adopted by the leaders who met in the highland city in Java in 1955 is still relevant today. The participants in the commemorative event should uphold the spirit and discuss in earnest how to achieve peace, coexistence and prosperity in Asia and Africa.

At the conference 60 years ago, Indonesian President Sukarno, Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai and Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser played key roles in raising the voices of newly independent countries to achieve solidarity among themselves and ease the East-West confrontation at a time when the world was in the grip of the Cold War being waged between East and West blocs led by the Soviet Union and the United States.

Japan and China were among the participants in the Bandung Conference, which took place not long after both countries began their postwar diplomacy — just three years after the Allied occupation of Japan ended and six years after the People's Republic of China was established.

The Bandung declaration adopted by the 29 participating countries called for, among other things, respect for fundamental human rights, the recognition of the equality of all races and all nations large and small, abstention from interference in the internal affairs of another country, settlement of all international disputes by peaceful means in conformity with the United Nations charter, and avoidance of the use of collective defense arrangements to serve the interests of major powers.

The declaration not only gave impetus to the independence of nations that remained colonies of Western powers but also helped forge the nonalignment movement through which many countries participated in international politics from neutral positions without belonging to either the U.S. or the Soviet bloc.

Countries the world over should take the spirit of the Bandung declaration seriously and apply it to today's international situation. Some 60 percent of the world's 7.2 billion people live in Asia and 15.5 percent in Africa, and these regions are fraught with conflicts. The Islamic State extremist group is bent on military conquest and terrorism. In the East and South China seas, China is engaged in territorial rows with its neighbors. The conflict between Israel and Palestinian people drags on. The leaders gathering in Jakarta should consider how to translate the spirit of the Bandung conference into concrete action geared to solving these and other conflicts and problems that the world is facing today.

Asia has become a crucial engine of global growth while Africa has a great potential for economic development. How to increase trade and investments between the two regions for mutual prosperity should be an important agenda for the leaders. Despite Africa's economic potential, however, many countries in the continent still suffer from grave problems ranging from poverty to epidemics. The outbreak of the Ebola virus, which began in West Africa in late 2013, has infected some 25,500 people and caused more than 10,000 deaths. Measures to combat these problems should be discussed.

In the six decades following the Bandung Conference, both Japan and China have become global economic powers that can play important roles in the betterment of both Asia and Africa. The two countries need to explore ways in which they can most effectively assist the developing nations in these regions, working together with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations as well as with emerging economies like India and South Africa.