Japan’s Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi is on her way to what she expects will be a “very difficult” meeting with US leader Donald Trump, days after his calls for allies to help secure the war-stricken Strait of Hormuz went largely unanswered.
Takaichi told parliament hours before her departure that she would “do everything to maximise [Japan’s] national interest”.
The three-day visit to Washington was a chance to talk trade and deepen the US-Japan alliance ahead of Trump’s diplomatic trip to China, which has now been postponed because of the war.
But now it is the topic of the war that will likely overshadow the meeting, which is shaping up to be a test of Takaichi’s friendship with Trump.
The trip was scheduled back in October, a week after Takaichi took office, when Tokyo rolled out the red carpet for Trump and the two leaders heaped compliments on each other, heralding a new “golden age” in bilateral ties.
As of a few weeks ago, the upcoming meeting looked set to be a success, with Takaichi “fresh off a dominant election victory and with a new round of investment projects in the US”, Emma Chanlett-Avery, director for political and security affairs at the Asia Society Policy Institute, told the BBC.
But while Takaichi “had intended to build on the warmth of her first meeting with Trump and press upon him Japan’s concerns about Chinese aggression ahead of Trump’s [then scheduled] meeting with Xi”, recent events have complicated things, said Chanlett-Avery.
Earlier this week, Trump posted on his Truth Social platform a call for some countries to help secure the vital strait.
He had pointed to Japan’s and other Asian economies’ dependence on fuel from the Middle East as reason for them to get involved.
“We get less than 1% of our oil from the [Strait of Hormuz] and some countries get much more… We want them to come and help us,” he wrote.
But after receiving a lukewarm response, he retracted his request, saying in a later post that the US did “NOT NEED THE HELP OF ANYONE!”.
Takaichi had acknowledged the challenges she faced with a trip to the White House at this time.
“I want to engage in substantial discussions based on Japan’s point of view and our way of thinking,” she told reporters on Wednesday. “The top priority is the early de-escalation of the situation.”
