Japan, China ministers meet, agree to improve ties

HANOI (Reuters) - Japan and China have agreed to improve ties, Japan's foreign minister said on Friday after talks with his Chinese counterpart likely to set the stage for fence-mending between the leaders of Asia's biggest economies.

Japanese Foreign Minister Seiji Maehara told reporters after meeting China's Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi that the leaders of both nations, whose ties have been strained by a dispute over islands in the East China Sea, were likely to hold one-on-one talks on the sidelines of an Asian summit in Hanoi.