Iran Press/Asia: Japanese Finance Minister Taro Aso told reporters in Beijing following the China-Japan Finance Dialogue that in the current round both sides agreed to maintain cooperation in macro-economic policies and measures.
Japanese Finance Minister, who is also Japan’s deputy prime minister, also added that the Chinese side was “cordial”.
The dialogue was the seventh of its kind, with the last one held in May 2017. “The mood was extremely good,” Aso noted.
China and Japan agreed to uphold a multilateral trading system that is based on free market rules, Japanese Finance Minister stated.
When asked by reporters if there is a contradiction in that China itself is a closed economy with restrictions on foreign companies and investors, Aso said it is also matter of keeping one’s promises.
“There’s no question about that. Their restrictions and our restrictions are different in meaning. What’s important this time is that we got their word into the agreement that they will work (to create an economy that’s based on free and open rules),” Japanese Finance Minister noted.
“We can say you did say it was important to (honor trade systems). We can continue to negotiate based on those words (of promise)”, Japanese Finance Minister Taro Aso concluded.
The dialogue follows a meeting between Abe and Premier Li Keqiang in May in which China agreed to sign a currency swap deal with Japan and grant Japanese investors for the first time an investment quota under the Renminbi Qualified Foreign Institutional Investors (RQFII) program.
Japan hopes bilateral financial cooperation, including resumption of currency swap arrangements, will pave the way for a meeting between Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Chinese President Xi Jinping later this year in Beijing.
The RQFII program was set up in 2011 to allow overseas financial institutions to use offshore yuan to purchase securities in mainland China including stocks, bonds and money market instruments.
The exchange took place against a backdrop of intensifying Sino-U.S. trade frictions that have raised concerns about protectionism and its impact on the global economy.
China and Japan both condemned in May. 24, the Trump administration's decision to launch an investigation into whether tariffs are needed on imports of vehicles and automotive parts into the United States.
President Donald Trump invoked a provision authorizing the president to restrict imports and impose unlimited tariffs on national security grounds, known as Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962.
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