TOKYO: Japan is trying to ensure Xi Jinping doesn’t snub Sanae Takaichi when they meet at a major leaders’ summit in China this month - their first encounter since a furore over Taiwan derailed ties.
When Takaichi attends the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation conclave in Shenzhen, Japanese officials expect the host leader to greet her with at least a customary handshake. Ties between Japan and China, however, have over the past year hit one of their lowest ebbs since the countries normalised relations in 1972 - throwing such a reception into doubt.
Xi shook then-Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s hand the last time China hosted APEC back in 2014 during an earlier period of strained ties, but unlike today the groundwork for that detente had been laid months in advance.
Japanese officials have sought reassurances from China that Xi will give Takaichi the same treatment as other world leaders, according to people familiar with the matter. Tokyo will protest anything unusual planned for the conference on Nov. 18-19, added the people, who weren’t authorised to discuss private matters.
"Over the past year, Beijing has personalised its rhetorical attacks against Japan, many of which focus on demonising Takaichi to an unusual degree,” said Jeremy Chan, a senior analyst at the Eurasia Group and former US diplomat. "That increases the chances China could find an opportunity at APEC to personally embarrass her by downgrading her status or criticising Japan.”
Underscoring the risks, Xi publicly rebuked Canada’s then-Prime Minister Justin Trudeau during a Group of Twenty summit in Indonesia in 2022 after a yearslong spat - a tense exchange caught on camera. Seating plans and family photos both pose other opportunities for Takaichi to be sidelined.
Asia’s top two economies have been at loggerheads since Takaichi last November said a Chinese attack on Taiwan could pose an existential threat to Japan. While that’s long been the view among Japanese leaders, others had avoided stating it publicly.
Her remarks came only a week after she met Xi on the sidelines of the APEC summit in South Korea - timing that appeared to intensify the Chinese anger.
In retaliation, China has choked exports to Japan of the rare earths over which it holds a near monopoly and are critical to its neighbour’s semiconductor and auto industries. US manufacturers that rely on Japan for certain magnets are also hurting, prompting Donald Trump to ask Xi in September to ease the measures.
Takaichi’s visit to China is particularly fraught because Xi appears to have personally demanded she retract her remarks on Taiwan, according to some Japanese officials. So far, Japan’s first female premier has refused - and pushed ahead with a security agenda that has further angered China.
Plans for maritime boundary talks with the Philippines announced in May to resolve their overlapping maritime border east of Taiwan upset China, along with suggestions from leading government officials in Tokyo that they may discuss revising a ban on the entry of nuclear weapons into Japan.
Chances for a Takaichi-Xi meeting at the APEC summit are low, people familiar with the planning said. Encounters are likely to be limited to customary interactions as part of APEC’s formal programme, such as the leaders’ dinner, where Xi is expected to meet and greet each leader.
Trump and Russia’s Vladimir Putin are also set to hold a trilateral with China’s top leader at the APEC arena - marking the first time in post-World War II history the heads of those three nuclear-armed powers have huddled. For Takaichi, that raises the risk of looking isolated from Washington, which is Japan’s sole formal ally.
Takaichi has a chance to catch Trump in Manila at the Asean summit days before the Chinese conference, giving her a channel to convey a message to Beijing. That’s a tactic she used in September on the sidelines of the United Nations in New York, seeking to ensure Tokyo’s interests weren’t traded away at Trump’s White House summit with Xi.
Chinese Premier Li Qiang will also attend Asean, where he could meet Takaichi - technically his counterpart, given she isn’t a head of state.
While China’s ties with Japan had been rocky for decades over disputes spanning Tokyo’s invasion of its neighbour in the 1930s to competing territorial claims, relations had stabilised in the months before Takaichi swept to power. China’s reaction to the views of Takaichi, who visited Taiwan’s President Lai Ching-te in April 2025 months before becoming leader, has changed the relationship.
China has urged its citizens - who made up about a quarter of all visitors to Japan before the spat - to avoid its Asian neighbour, citing safety risks. It’s also curbed seafood imports and put Japanese companies on lists that control or monitor their access to Chinese products with military uses.
Classifying a Chinese invasion of Taiwan as an existential threat to Japan could provide the legal basis for Tokyo to deploy its military as part of a collective response with the US. That prospect has fuelled a narrative in China that Japan is returning to its militaristic past under Takaichi, which Tokyo has denied.
While APEC in 2014 helped deliver a detente, that was preceded by a meeting between senior officials days before the summit where Tokyo offered an olive branch. Chinese state media touted that huddle as a "diplomatic win” after Japan "for the first time” acknowledged the two countries’ claims over disputed islands.
There have been no such exchanges this time. Chinese officials have only met with figures outside Takaichi’s cabinet.
When former Japanese prime minister, Yasuo Fukuda, died last month, Xi bypassed Takaichi and sent a condolence letter directly to his wife.
Komeito, a party known for its ties to China and the former coalition partner of Takaichi’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party, helped lay the groundwork for the Xi-Abe sit-down. When Takaichi became prime minister, Komeito exited the coalition.
Going into APEC, Japan’s leader just needs to handle things calmly and steadily, said Masaki Taniguchi, a professor of political science at the University of Tokyo.
"There’s no need to provoke China unnecessarily,” he added. "Conversely, Japan has absolutely no reason to kowtow to China either.” - Bloomberg
