Item 1 of 5 Japan’s Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi shakes hands with South Korea’s President Lee Jae Myung at the start of their summit meeting in Nara, western Japan January 13, 2026. REUTERS/Issei Kato/Pool
[1/5] Japan’s Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi shakes hands with South Korea’s President Lee Jae Myung at the start of their summit meeting in Nara, western Japan January 13, 2026. REUTERS/Issei Kato/Pool Purchase Licensing Rights , opens new tab
NARA, Jan 13 (Reuters) – Japan and South Korea aim to deepen security and economic ties to counter growing tension in East Asia, their leaders said on Tuesday, after a summit meeting in Japan.
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi and South Korean President Lee Jae Myung discussed industrial supply chains, artificial intelligence, denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula and cooperation with mutual ally, the United States.
“The importance of Japan–South Korea relations, as well as cooperation among Japan, South Korea and the United States, continues to grow,” Takaichi said in a joint announcement with Lee in her home region of Nara.
Lee said the leaders will also step up cooperation to combat online scams that have targeted victims across borders.
The talks came a week after Lee met Chinese President Xi Jinping, amid strained ties between Tokyo and Beijing following remarks by Takaichi that Japan could deploy its forces if a Chinese attack on Taiwan posed an existential threat.
China regards Taiwan as part of its territory, a claim the democratically governed island rejects.
LEE SAYS TASK OF DEEPENING TIES IS URGENT
Earlier, Lee, who is set to spend two days in Japan, vowed not to intervene in its dispute with China, although the diplomatic stand-off was not desirable for regional peace.
“The current international environment and trade order are unprecedentedly volatile,” he said, speaking alongside Takaichi. “It is an urgent task of our time to deepen bilateral relations.”
Despite a recent thaw, ties between Tokyo and Seoul have been strained by disputes over Japan’s colonial rule of the Korean peninsula, including the treatment of Korean women forced to work in military brothels and labourers conscripted to support Japan’s wartime effort.
Takaichi added that she welcomed progress in efforts to identify human remains discovered at an abandoned coal mine in western Japan, where some 136 Koreans and 47 Japanese died in 1942, when the mine beneath the seabed collapsed and flooded.
South Korea says the remains of as many as 10,000 Korean forced labourers are still in Japan, which says it has identified about 3,000.
The leaders said they would continue their “shuttle diplomacy” effort, with Takaichi expected to travel next to South Korea for their third meeting, without giving a date.
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