Japan PM Ishiba Ends Expo Diplomacy

Tokyo, Oct. 13 (Jiji Press)–Japan’s Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba actively interacted with foreign dignitaries who visited the East Asian nation to attend the 2025 World Exposition in the western city of Osaka. During the six-month period of the Osaka Expo, which ended Monday, a total of about 90 foreign heads of state and government leaders traveled to Japan mainly to participate in their respective “national day” events. Ishiba met with some 50 of the foreign leaders in the so-called Expo diplomacy, with the topics including measures to strengthen bilateral relations, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and North Korea’s abductions of Japanese nationals decades ago. The first of the series of meetings took place April 15, two days after the opening of the Expo, with Ishiba holding talks with Turkmen President Serdar Berdimuhamedov. The last of the meetings, with Anthony Franck Laurent Saint-Cyr, president of Haiti’s Transitional Presidential Council, was held Thursday. From the United States, a delegation led by Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent traveled to Japan in July although a visit by President Donald Trump in line with the U.S. national day on July 19 did not materialize. Also in July, Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng came to Japan and met with Hiroshi Moriyama, then secretary-general of Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party, who heads a suprapartisan group of Japanese lawmakers working to promote ties with China. The Chinese side informed Japan that an animal health and quarantine agreement needed for China’s resumption of beef imports from Japan took effect in the same month. From Europe, leaders of countries including Austria, Finland and Portugal came to Japan while Ishiba, who is set to step down shortly, has not traveled to the region since he became prime minister in October 2024. The Osaka Expo was “a precious opportunity of diplomacy” for Japan, a senior Foreign Ministry official said, noting, “We were able to hold high-level talks with countries with which mutual visits by high-ranking officials have not taken place in the past five to 10 years.” During the 2005 World Expo in the central Japan prefecture of Aichi, then French President Jacques Chirac and other foreign leaders visited Japan, and then Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi held a total of about 30 rounds of summit talks. This time, the number of such meetings rose due to an increase in countries participating in the World Expo. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]