Japanese news agency Kyodo cited diplomatic sources Thursday as saying that leaders of South Korea, China and Japan are likely to discuss economic cooperation and regional issues, including North Korea's nuclear and missile threats. Seoul and Tokyo are reportedly hoping that China will use its influence over Pyongyang to address concerns over these issues.
South Korea, the current rotating chair of the dialogue, has been seeking to host the summit in 2023 and April 2024, the report cited sources as saying.
The countries' foreign ministers met in November 2023 to agree on the date of the next summit. South Korean media then reported that the ministers had failed to agree on the date but expressed willingness to accelerate the preparation for the summit and continue efforts to make sure that the summit is held "in the near future."
The first China-Japan-South Korea trilateral summit was held in the Japanese city of Fukuoka in December 2008. Since then leaders of the three countries have met eight times, with the latest summit taking place in December 2019 in the Chinese city of Chengdu. By tradition, the next meeting is to be held in South Korea.
However, 2020's summit was prevented by the COVID-19 pandemic and difficulties in relations between Seoul and Tokyo over a South Korean court's decision to demand compensation to victims of Japan's forced labor mobilization during World War II. Following a compromise decision by the new South Korean government to bear the cost of the compensation, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said at a bilateral meeting with South Korean President Yoon Suk-Yeol in March 2023 that he shared Seoul's view of the need to resume trilateral summits as soon as possible.