Tokyo, 11 March, /AJMEDIA/
TOKYO – Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said Friday that German Chancellor Olaf Scholz is scheduled to visit Japan, along with six members of his cabinet, to hold the two countries’ first high-level intergovernmental talks on March 18.
The gathering, expected to last for more than four hours, comes as Japan, which holds this year’s Group of Seven presidency, seeks to lay the ground for the G7 summit to be hosted in Kishida’s home constituency of Hiroshima in May.
The G7 groups Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States, plus the European Union. In January, Kishida made a weeklong trip to the G7 countries other than Germany in the run-up to the summit.
Kishida has pledged to pitch his vision of a world without nuclear weapons at the G7 summit in Hiroshima, which was devastated by a U.S. atomic bomb in August 1945, amid growing fears that Russia might use a nuclear device against Ukraine in the ongoing war.
At a meeting between the government and the ruling bloc on Friday, Kishida also said he is slated to visit India from March 19 for talks with his counterpart Narendra Modi.
Kishida’s trip to India, the chair of the Group of 20 economies for 2023, is set to come just weeks after Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi skipped a gathering of the G20’s top diplomats held for two days earlier this month in New Delhi.
Hayashi’s absence triggered a backlash in some parts of the Indian media, which said it could cast a shadow over bilateral relations.
Kishida has been eager to confirm with Modi that Tokyo and New Delhi, as this year’s G7 and G20 presidents, will work together more closely to grapple with issues stemming from Russia’s war in Ukraine, government sources said.
During the envisioned talks, Kishida is likely to invite Modi to participate in the G7 summit, the sources added.
Along with the G7 members, the G20 also includes Argentina, Australia, Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea and Turkey.
