Wang Yi, Chinese ambassador to Japan, speaks at the Tokyo-Beijing Forum sponsored by China Daily, Peking University and the Japanese think tank Genron NPO in Tokyo August 3, 2006. [chinadaily.com.cn]

Chinese President Hu Jintao, at a March meeting with the heads of seven Japan-China friendship organizations, said Beijing values the Sino-Japanese relationship and regards it as one of the world's most important bilateral relationships. China has made unswerving efforts to improve ties, he said.

Hu has offered to enter into talks with Japan's top leaders as soon as they make an unequivocal decision to stop visiting the Yasukuni Shrine.

The relationship between China and Japan has been chilled in recent years due to Japanese Prime Minister Koizumi Junichiro's repeated pilgrimage to the Yasukuni Shrine, which honors 2.5 million Japanese war dead, including 14 Class-A World War II criminals.

Leaders of the two neighboring countries have halted exchanges of visit for about five years, ever since Koizumi began paying homage to the controversial war shrine soon after he took office in 2001.

Zhu Ling, editor-in-chief of China Daily, extended his greetings to all participants as one of the organizers and said the newspaper, with a mission of letting the world know and understand China better, will play its role in promoting the development of China-Japan relations.

He said media exchange is part of the efforts for developing peaceful, friendly and cooperative Sino-Japanese relations. Polls have found that media is the main channel for the peoples of the two countries to know the other and the media now has an increasingly important impact on bilteral ties.

China Daily, as the most influential English-language newspaper in China, will continue to organize the forum and play its role in building an ideal platform for bilateral exchanges and mutual understanding.

Zhao Qizheng, vice director of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, proposed "public diplomacy" for China-Japan relations.

Apart from diplomatic activities by state leaders and ministry of foreign affairs, he said, exchanges among institutions as school, companies, research institutes, the media, the cultural circles and celebrities in the two countries could help promote better mutual understanding.

Zhao said the forum is one of the activities that should be encouraged.