Japan-China Friendship Parliamentarians Alliance plans to visit Beijing this month, hoping to improve Sino-Japanese relations

(Central News Agency, Tokyo, 4th Comprehensive Foreign News Report) As relations between Japan and China are in a downturn, Yu Moriyama, president of Japan's cross-party Japan-China Friendship Parliamentarians Alliance, said that members of the alliance, mainly young parliamentarians, plan to visit Beijing this month. The Chinese party has not yet been finalized for talks and is still coordinating.

Jiji News Agency and Japan's TBS TV station reported that Yu Moriyama, former secretary-general of the Liberal Democratic Party, told the media about this matter yesterday.

Relations between the two countries have deteriorated since Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi angered Beijing with remarks related to Taiwan in November, bringing parliamentary diplomacy to a standstill. The Japan-China Friendship Parliamentarians Alliance hopes to have active exchanges and seek opportunities to improve bilateral relations through the visit to China.

The most recent visit to China by the Japan-China Friendship Parliamentarians Alliance was in April 2025. The alliance was originally scheduled to visit China on the 5th of this month, but the visit was postponed after a self-defense officer broke into the Chinese Embassy in Tokyo with a knife. Last month, unlike the Japan-China Friendship Parliamentarians Alliance, Japanese cross-party parliamentarians led by Shinichi Isa, a Japanese member of the House of Representatives and chairman of the opposition party's Center for Reform Joint Propaganda Committee, also just visited Beijing and held talks with Lu Kang, deputy director of the International Liaison Department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China.

Regarding the Japan-China Friendship Parliamentarian Alliance’s plan to visit China this month, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun said yesterday that “some far-sighted people in Japan are deeply concerned about the current Sino-Japanese relations and hope to make efforts to improve bilateral relations.”

He continued: "As long as we can abide by the four political documents between China and Japan, pursue friendship with China, and cherish Sino-Japanese relations, we are willing to communicate with them to enhance mutual understanding and trust."