Japan has failed to respond positively to a proposal for a top-level meeting,
the Foreign Ministry said yesterday.
President Hu Jintao last Friday told a Japanese
delegation on a goodwill visit that he is ready to hold a summit with Japanese
Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi if he stops his visits to the Yasukuni Shrine
that honours war criminals of World War II.
Hu last met Koizumi in April last year on the sidelines of a regional
conference in Jakarta, Indonesia.
Japanese political figures including Foreign Minister Taro Aso and Shinzo
Abe, top spokesman in the cabinet and the frontrunner to be the next prime
minister rejected Hu's offer, saying that China's "method is beyond
comprehension."
"China has made unswerving efforts to make a summit meeting possible, but
regretfully, China fails to see a positive response from Japan," Foreign
Ministry spokesman Liu Jianchao said yesterday.
China's relations with Japan have been chilly in the past year mainly because
of Japanese leaders' repeated visits to the war shrine, a symbol of Japan's past
militarism.
China attaches great importance to mending the bitterness in Sino-Japanese
ties, Liu said, and urged Japan to correct its attitude on historical issues.
Liu reiterated at yesterday's twice-weekly briefing that the responsibility
does not lie with the Chinese side or the Japanese people; he blamed Japanese
leaders for their insistence on visiting the shrine.
"The visits hurt the feelings of the two peoples and undermine the political
basis for bilateral relations," Liu said.
Liu said Sino-Japanese ties face a difficult period, adding that Tokyo needs
to be sincere about major historical issues if it wants ties to return to normal
and develop further.