The postponement of the China-Japan summit scheduled for next month was not unanticipated, given the coronavirus epidemic afflicting both countries. Nevertheless, it is a disappointment. Since 2012, when the Japanese government nationalised the uninhabited Senkaku Islands, called Diaoyu by China, Sino-Japanese relations have trodden a rocky path. Mr Shinzo Abe’s second stint as Japan’s prime minister, which began soon after the islands were taken over, hardened attitudes in Beijing. He was seen as a revisionist all too willing to play cat’s paw for the United States’ attempts to check China’s rise. Mr Abe’s enthusiastic support for the now-defunct Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement idea that emerged from the Obama administration’s “rebalance” to Asia, and which pointedly excluded China, fuelled the perception. A lot has changed in international relations since and the now-cancelled summit would have reflected that.

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