Jan 29 12:00 PM US/EasternPresident Barack Obama is looking forward to an early meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Taro Aso, his spokesman said Thursday after the two leaders spoke by telephone.
Obama, in his first conversation with Aso since his inauguration last week, vowed "deep commitment" to the Japan-US alliance and vowed to work with Tokyo on the global economic crisis and the North Korean nuclear wrangle.
"President Obama said he looked forward to an early meeting with the Japanese Prime Minister," White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said in a statement on the "substantive and wide-ranging" call.
Earlier, the Japanese foreign ministry said Obama and Aso spoke for 10 minutes and agreed on the need to work to secure "peace and prosperity in the Asia-Pacific region," a ministry statement said.
They also agreed to address "North Korean issues including the abduction issue and to further strengthen the Japan-US alliance," the foreign ministry said.
Japan is pressing Pyongyang to come clean on the fate of Japanese citizens kidnapped by North Korean agents in the 1970s and 1980s to train its spies in Japanese language and culture.
Aso, a conservative who is struggling in opinion polls, faced opposition criticism last year for failing to stop the United States from removing North Korea from a blacklist of state sponsors of terrorism.
The United States, under the Bush administration, took the action as part of a denuclearization deal, but Japan had wanted further movement on the abduction row.
Japanese politicians and media place immense significance on how Washington treats Tokyo compared with emerging powers, with some jittery that the Obama administration is more inclined to work with China than Japan.
Japan-US ties reached new heights during the 2001-2006 premiership of Junichiro Koizumi, who cultivated a close relationship with then-US president George W. Bush and took the landmark step of sending troops to Iraq.
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