Chinese Premier Li Keqiang on Saturday started his official visit to the Republic of Korea (ROK) and is scheduled to attend the China-Japan-ROK summit after a three-and-a-half-year hiatus of the trilateral mechanism.
Interpreting this as a sign of thawing ties, experts in the region believe resumption of the summit will help improve security and cooperation in Northeast Asia and also push forward free trade talks between the three countries.
But they also said that it is not enough for the trilateral mechanism to simply return to the point where it was three years ago. In particular, the Japanese government should rethink its policy toward China and South Korea and its attitude toward historical issues, so that the overall political, economic and trade relations between the three nations will return to a balanced and healthy track.
"IMBALANCE"
Liu Jiangyong, vice dean of the Institute of Modern International Relations at Tsinghua University, described the current state of relations between China, Japan and South Korea as an "imbalance."
"Since the beginning of the 21st century, China-South Korea, China-Japan and South Korea-Japan relations have been developing unevenly. And the root cause is Japan's political drift toward the right," he said.
That imbalance is evident in many aspects, he said. China's fast growth is changing the economic landscape in Northeast Asia. However, due to the twists and turns in Sino-Japanese relations, Japan failed to ride on the fast train of the Chinese economy, while South Korea caught up quickly.
Politically, the leaders of China and South Korea exchanged visits in 2013 and 2014, strengthening cooperation based on the China-South Korea Joint Statement for the Future as well as the Action Plan to Enrich the China-South Korea Strategic Cooperative Partnership. In contrast, since Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe returned to power in 2012, Japan's relations with the two neighbors soured.
"Some people say the deterioration of Sino-Japanese relations is due to the transfer of power in East Asia as China rises, but the view can't explain why the China-South Korea ties improved while the relations between Japan and South Korea encountered obstacles," Liu said.
As a crucial part of East Asian cooperation, the trilateral mechanism was initiated in 1999 with annual leaders' meetings launched in 2008, and has played an important role in promoting mutual political trust, economic cooperation and personnel exchanges between the three nations.
However, the meeting mechanism was suspended in 2012 due to a string of Japanese moves on historical and territorial issues that provoked China and South Korea. Japan's right-leaning politics have led to a suspension of the summit talks and damaged trilateral cooperation.
For example, during the past three years, first steps have been taken to realize the proposed China-South Korea Free Trade Area, while FTA negotiations between China, Japan and South Korea still lacked substantive progress.
COOPERATION
"The trilateral foreign ministers' meeting of China, Japan and South Korea held in Seoul in mid-March has laid the groundwork for the upcoming meeting of the three leaders," said former Chinese Ambassador to Japan Xu Dunxin.
As one of the world's most dynamic regions, East Asia faces complex challenges while enjoying a good momentum of overall development, he said. The three countries should work together to strengthen practical cooperation in various fields and jointly promote the peaceful and stable development in the region.
"Despite the handicap of the political ups and downs in relations between China and Japan and between South Korea and Japan and the weakness in the foundations of trust, a thriving center of economic growth and interdependence has been built among the Northeast Asian economies," said Peter Drysdale, economist and editor of the East Asia Forum at the Australian National University.
Shiro Armstrong, co-director of the Australia-Japan Research Center and co-editor of the East Asia Forum at the Australian National University, believes that warmer Sino-Japanese political relations are based on "overwhelming common economic interests."
"The importance of the Japan-China relationship is beyond bilateral. It is embedded in a deeply integrated region where supply chains and thick trade and investment flows with third countries mean that there is another dimension to the interdependence," he said in an article published in a recent edition of East Asia Forum Quarterly.
Meanwhile, Drysdale observed that the economies of China and Japan are deeply complementary. Though there is still a long way to go to restore political trust, practical cooperation between China, Japan and South Korea has continued to expand during these years. There are a lot of new issues that need to be addressed within the trilateral framework, including global warming, disaster prevention, nuclear safety and youth unemployment, said former South Korean Prime Minister Han Seung-soo earlier this year in an article published in the Japanese newspaper Asahi Shimbun.
"Why can't the three countries establish a consultation mechanism and actively contribute to the climate conference in Paris?" he wrote. In addition to the leaders' summit, China, Japan and South Korea have established 19 ministerial meeting mechanisms. This year the three countries will broaden the fields of cooperation and hold the first meeting of education ministers.
Yang Houlan, secretary-general of the Seoul-based China-Japan-South Korea Trilateral Cooperation Secretariat, told Xinhua that cooperation for sustainable development is one of the earliest and most productive fields in trilateral cooperation.
Meanwhile, in the field of humanities, personnel exchanges among the three countries last year surpassed two million, including 300,000 exchange students. The three countries have about 600 twin towns and sister cities and round-trip flights between the three countries have increased to more than 3,000 a week.
BAGGAGE OF HISTORY
Most experts believe that the improvement of trilateral ties between the three nations largely depends on Abe's policies. "If Abe continues to take disruptive action on historical issues and territorial disputes, then Sino-Japanese relations and the South Korea-Japan relations will once again be put to the test," Liu said.
Japan's historical baggage and Abe's historical view have prevented economic integration in Northeast Asia as well as attempts by China, Japan and South Korea to establish trust in the political and security fields, and build a more constructive and stable relationship, said Park Cheol-hee, an expert at Seoul National University.
"Therefore, there is an urgent need for Japan to learn the lessons of history, to correct its attitude toward history, to make important progress in regional issues," he said.
Drysdale also pointed out that both the baggage of history and the way in which the current Japanese leadership has dealt with it bedevil more productive and stable relations across the East Asian region.
"It sits like a dead weight upon progress on most dimensions of relations among Northeast Asia's three main powers -- China, Japan and South Korea," Drysdale said. "It sucks the oxygen out of the vibrant engine that these three economies collectively have the potential to become through deeper economic integration, not just for the East Asian region but also for the global economy," he said.
There is no doubt that Japan's attitude on historical issues and rightist policies have hampered its efforts to improve its relations with China and South Korea.
Meanwhile, Park believed that Japan, China and South Korea are now avoiding "decisive confrontation" and are gradually preparing a functional cooperation mechanism. "The leaders' summit may become the new starting point for the East Asian order," Park said.
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