BEIJING (Reuters) - China hopes to work with Japan to establish more cordial relations, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi told his Japanese counterpart on Sunday, aiming to move on from a series of disputes, some dating back to before World War Two.

Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Kono, left, shakes hands with his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi before their meeting at the Diaoyutai State Guesthouse in Beijing, China Jan. 28, 2018. REUTERS/Andy Wong/Pool

China and Japan have sparred frequently about their painful history, with Beijing often accusing Tokyo of not properly atoning for Japan’s invasion of China before and during the war.

Ties between China and Japan, the world’s second and third-largest economies, have also been plagued by a long-running territorial dispute over a cluster of East China Sea islets and suspicion in China about Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s efforts to amend Japan’s pacifist constitution.

The two nations have, however, sought to improve ties more recently, with Abe and Chinese President Xi Jinping having met in November on the sidelines of a regional summit in Vietnam.

Wang told Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Kono that his trip to Beijing, coming so early in the year, showed Japan’s strong wish to improve relations and that China approves of this because better ties would be in both nations’ interests.

Though there has been positive progress, there are also many “disturbances and obstacles”, Wang said, but the minister also pointed to comments from Abe on wanting to improve relations.

“China-Japan ties always sail against the current, either forging ahead or drifting backward,” Wang said in front of reporters at the start of talks with his counterpart.

“We hope that the Japanese side will neither relax in its efforts nor fall back, and turn the spoken statements into concrete actions.”

Kono, who later met Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, said that the two countries shared a major responsibility in safeguarding the stability and prosperity of Asia and the world at large.

“Not only do we need to manage our bilateral relations, but we also need to work together to deal with issues facing the entire globe, in particular the issue of North Korea,” Kono said. “We desire to extend mutual cooperation between our two countries in working towards resolving this issue.”

Japan has repeatedly pressed China to do more to help rein in North Korea’s missile and nuclear programmes. China says it is committed to enforcing U.N. sanctions but that all parties need to do more to reduce tensions and restart talks.

Japanese Foreign Ministry spokesman Norio Maruyama told reporters that China and Japan are aiming to hold several high-level visits this year. These would include Abe visiting China and Xi going to Japan, he said, though no dates have been set.

“Let’s see. It’s all a question of the schedule,” he said.</s>China has urged regional rival Japan to work with it to get strained relations between the two Asian giants back on to a normal track, as Japan’s foreign minister Taro Kono made his first official visit to Beijing.

China and Japan are the world’s second and third biggest economies, and relations have been tense for many years over numerous issues, in some cases dating back to Japan’s invasion and subsequent occupation of China in the 1930s.

China’s foreign minister Wang Yi urged Mr Kono to make joint efforts to bring bilateral ties “back to the track of sound development”.

“Your visit to China at the beginning of the year shows the Japanese government’s strong willingness to improve bilateral ties,” Mr Wang told his Japanese counterpart, who is making his first China visit as Japanese foreign minister.

Issues between the two countries include what China sees as Tokyo’s failure to properly atone for second World War atrocities and a dispute over islands in the East China Sea.

Both China and Japan claim a group of islands, known as the Senkakus in Japan, to whom they officially belong, and the Diaoyu Islands in China.

Recent weeks have seen tensions revived after Chinese coast guard vessels passed through what Japan considers its territorial waters surrounding the disputed islands.

“At present Sino-Japanese relations are at a crucial stage. There is positive progress, but many disturbances and obstacles remain,” Mr Wang told reporters in Beijing.

Other issues stretch back further. Japanese president Shinzo Abe has visited the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo, which honours 2.5 million Japanese war dead, including war criminals, and this has also complicated relations.

China and Japan are marking the 40th anniversary of the signing of a peace and friendship treaty between the two countries.

Mr Wang urged Japan “not to slack or fall back, and work together with China to meet each other halfway”.

“To improve and develop China-Japan relations meets the interests of both sides, and common aspirations of various circles of the two societies,” Mr Wang said.

He said Tokyo and Beijing needed to work together on broader issues too, such as the North Korea nuclear issue.

Pyongyang fired a ballistic missile over the Japanese island of Hokkaido last year, and Tokyo has long sought more Chinese assistance in reining in North Korea’s nuclear ambitions.

Last week Mr Abe said Japan was willing to promote the relationship in a policy speech.

Mr Abe and China’s president Xi Jinping have yet to exchange official visits, which is largely down to the row over the islands. In 2014 they exchanged a famously ill-tempered handshake.

Mr Kono said Japan and China shared a major responsibility in safeguarding the stability and prosperity of Asia and the world at large.

“Not only do we need to manage our bilateral relations, but we also need to work together to deal with issues facing the entire globe, in particular the issue of North Korea, which is the matter at hand for the international community as a whole,” Mr Kono said.

Later in his visit Mr Kono will meet senior foreign policy adviser Yang Jiechi, and visit top leaders, possibly including Mr Xi.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi meets with Japanese Foreign Minister Tarō Kōno in Beijing and says they hope to work to improve relations.