(chinadaily.com.cn/agencies)
Updated: 2008-05-07 17:01

Top leaders of China and Japan agreed Wednesday not to see each other as a threat, and to launch annual summit alternating between Beijing and Tokyo, in order to put the key Asian bilateral relationship on a permanent keel to improvement.

Chinese President Hu Jintao (L) and Japan's Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda shake hands as they exchange signed documents during a signing ceremony at Fukuda's official residence in Tokyo May 7, 2008. [Agencies] For More Photos

Paying the first visit by a Chinese head of state to Tokyo in a decade, President Hu Jintao praised Japan's peaceful role in world affairs after the World War II and offered to lend two precious giant pandas to a Tokyo zoo.

Relations between the two countries have been uneasy in the past years because of disputes over Japan's wartime atrocities in China and elsewhere in Asia, and their dispute over ownership of gas fields in the East China Sea.

But Japan counts on better ties with China, its top commercial partner. Beijing intends to ease regional tension as it seeks a more cordial relationship with Tokyo and a more economically co-operative Asia, in which all Asian economies will benefit.

"China and Japan have no other way but to take the path of peace, friendship and cooperation as neighbours and countries with significant influence to Asia and the world," President Hu told a joint press conference with Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda.

In a joint statement, Hu and Fukuda said they "confirmed that the two nations are cooperative partners, not threats, to each other" and share responsibilities "for the world's peace and development in the 21st century."

The major policy statement between the two, also called for the two countries' leaders to hold summits once a year alternating between Japan and China, and pledged in-depth cooperation on fighting global warming.

In a striking contrast to many previous meetings between the countries, the joint statement made no direct reference to Japan's invasion of China before World War II.

On Wednesday, Emperor Akihito and other members of the imperial family gave President Hu a red-carpet welcome and honour guard at their sprawling palace in central Tokyo.

The joint statement said that China "takes a positive view of the more than 60 years since the war during which Japan has developed into a peaceful state and contributed by peaceful means to the world's peace and stability."

It did not touch on the thorny territorial dispute over gas fields in the East China Sea.

But PM Fukuda said the two countries believed "a solution is in sight."

"We agreed to solve the issue as soon as possible," PM Fukuda told reporters.

President Hu also said that the two sides were "beginning to see the larger picture in solving this issue."