Press Conference by the Press Secretary 13 November, 1998

1. Summit Meeting between Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi and President Boris Yeltsin of the Russian Federation
2. Dispatch of Japan Disaster Relief Team of Japanese Self-Defense Forces to the Republic of Honduras
3. Legal basis for dispatch of the Japanese Self-Defense Forces to the Republic of Honduras
4. Agenda of visit by President William Clinton of the United States to Japan
5. Possibility of the issuing of an apology by the Government of Japan during the visit by President Jiang Zemin of the People's Republic of China to Japan

1. Summit Meeting between Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi and President Boris Yeltsin of the Russian Federation

   Deputy Press Secretary Masaki Okada: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. First, I would like to brief you on the Summit Meeting between Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi and President Boris Yeltsin of the Russian Federation which took place yesterday at 10:30 Moscow time for about an hour at the Kremlin. The talks took place in a very intimate and candid atmosphere. They were talks with far-sighted and wide-ranging viewpoints ideal for the highest-level talks. The excellent relation already existing between Prime Minister Obuchi and President Yeltsin was further deepened at this Summit Meeting and Japan-Russia relations have progressed to new developments from the stage of so-called mutual trust to that of agreement. That means we think our relation until now was, somewhat, building mutual trust and confidence building but now it is time for us to act on the basis of mutual agreements. So both leaders agreed to develop Japan-Russia relations in all fields towards the 21st century and to construct a creative partnership. This is the key term, "creative partnership" between two countries. Creative partnership means that both countries will open new possibilities as partners in politics, economics, security, culture, international cooperation and all other areas, and promote their cooperation.

   Concerning the Peace Treaty, there are several points. First, the Russian side carefully examined the Japanese proposal made in Kawana and presented a counterproposal as its response to it. Japan promised to examine the Russian counterproposal and give its reply by the next Summit Meeting which may take place early next year. Both sides also agreed to further accelerate the work of the Joint Japan-Russia Federation Committee on the Conclusion of the Peace Treaty in response to the strong will expressed by President Yeltsin. Both sides agreed to set up a Subcommittee on Demarcation and a Subcommittee on Joint Economic Activities and that is a joint committee. Both sides also agreed in principle to realize free visits of ex-residents of the Northern Territories to their ex-residences. These are concerning the Peace Treaty.

   We also talked about measures for cooperation. Prime Minister Obuchi explained the following four points as new measures for Japan-Russia cooperation and President Yeltsin highly evaluated these. The first one is the implementation of the US$800 million credit within the US$1.5 billion Export-Import Bank of Japan untied loan which we already pledged early this year. The second one is the Japan-Russia Partnership for Reform. That is a program to drastically expand intellectual and technical cooperation. An additional US$100 million contribution towards that end was announced from the Japanese side. The third one is the establishment of the Japan-Russia Center for Youth Exchange, the so-called Obuchi-Yeltsin Center, to drastically expand grassroots-level exchange or private exchange between our two countries. We announced the implementation of youth exchange programs covering 1,000 people. The fourth one is Japanese emergency aid amounting to US$10 million in the form of medicines or medical equipment. Prime Minister Obuchi repeated his invitation to President Yeltsin to pay an official visit to Japan early next year and the President accepted this with gratitude. Both sides also agreed to incorporate the result of the talks in the Moscow Declaration and instructed officials to work on it. This is the result of the Summit Meeting which took place yesterday, and still the work is going on in Moscow.

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2. Dispatch of Japan Disaster Relief Team of Japanese Self-Defense Forces to the Republic of Honduras

   Deputy Press Secretary Masaki Okada: I would like to make another short statement concerning the dispatch of a Japan Disaster Relief Team to Honduras. I think the press release has been given to you therefore I will make it brief. Today, the Government of Japan decided to dispatch Japanese Self-Defense Forces (JSDF) units as a Japan Disaster Relief Team to Honduras on the basis of the Law Concerning the Dispatch of Japan Disaster Relief Teams. At the last press conference, I explained to you that on 9 November, Japan dispatched a team of officials to Honduras and on 12 November, yesterday, the team reported the results of their survey, and it has been confirmed that the dispatch of JSDF units, which can conduct systematic and independent relief activities, is appropriate and that the units will be able to work very effectively. Today, therefore, Director General Fukushiro Nukaga of the Defense Agency replied to acting Minister for Foreign Affairs Hiromu Nonaka that he was ready to cooperate in response to a formal request consultation received from Minister for Foreign Affairs Masahiko Koumura. As a result, units will be dispatched to Honduras. These units will engage in medical treatment and prevention of epidemics in Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras. Related to this, we also decided to send a medical team to Nicaragua, yesterday. This is what we are now doing concerning personnel assistance to those countries afflicted by Hurricane Mitch.

   Related Information (Japan-Honduras Relations)
   
3. Legal basis for dispatch of the Japanese Self-Defense Forces to the Republic of Honduras

   Q: Regarding this dispatch to Honduras, most of the Japanese dispatches so far seem to have been to areas that have been hit by conflict rather than disasters, as far as I know. Is this a new development to send Japanese relief teams to --

   Mr. Okada: There are two different sets of law in Japan. One is concerning the Japanese contribution to peace-keeping operations, but this is another set of law which is aimed at disaster relief. In that context, we have sent quite many teams, private personnel and also medical experts and so on, but this is the first case for us to apply this Law to send units of the JSDF.

   Q: Could you say roughly how much this is likely to cost, this operation, if there is any estimate? And Japan committed itself to providing financial assistance as well to Honduras and Nicaragua?

   Mr. Okada: Yes. I have no estimates here concerning the cost side of this dispatch of the units to Honduras. However, as far as assistance to the countries damaged by Hurricane Mitch, we already decided to help, both in the form of materials or goods or in the form of grant money. In total for these four countries; Honduras, Nicaragua, Guatemala and El Salvador, the materials are equivalent to 60.1 million yen and aid-in-grant is US$1.5 million. In particular for Honduras, we already sent materials equivalent to 15.96 million yen and aid-in-grant is US$ 800,000. For Nicaragua, materials are equivalent to 19.89 million yen and aid-in-grant is US$500,000. Those are the totals for Honduras and Nicaragua. In addition to that as I told you, we are now sending JSDF units to Honduras and a team of medical experts to Nicaragua.

   Q: Regarding the JSDF units that are going, it says that an 80-person medical team -- will there be any non-medical JSDF personnel?

   Mr. Okada: A few lines below it states that 105 personnel must operate these transport airplanes. Therefore, they are going there.

   Q: They are the only ones?

   Mr. Okada: Yes.

   Q: There will be no troops as such?

   Mr. Okada: No troops. Just pilots and so on.

4. Agenda of visit by President William Clinton of the United States to Japan

   Q: Could you tell us whether the agenda for Clinton's visit to Japan has begun to take shape and what kind of items are likely to be on the agenda that is known?

   Mr. Okada: We are still working on that and we are not in a position to tell the detailed agenda items, but we can understand that the bilateral relations between the United States and Japan are such comprehensive ones. Therefore, first of all we have to talk about bilateral relations, of course, political and also economic. We are going to talk about regional affairs and international affairs. Concerning regional affairs, especially stability and security issues, the recent development in security in this region caused by the missile launch by North Korea is one of the topics we are going to discuss. There are many other urgent items which might be discussed between the two leaders.

   Q: There have been some reports that Mr. Clinton may push the trade issue very high up on the agenda. I wonder if the preliminary discussion of government officials that --

   Mr. Okada: Maybe you have just read a newspaper report in Japan that President William Clinton of the United States passed a letter to Prime Minister Obuchi. We received that letter. The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Meeting is going to be held and President Clinton is going to Japan. Therefore he stated that we are going to intensively exchange opinions on many kinds of things. Concerning details, we just started examination of the consideration of how we can respond to that.

   Q: In the letter, it did mention the trade issue?

   Mr. Okada: I am not in a position to tell you the details of the specific points of the letter, but it generally says that we should strengthen our exchange of opinions on various things which are of mutual concern.

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5. Possibility of the issuing of an apology by the Government of Japan during the visit by President Jiang Zemin of the People's Republic of China to Japan

   Q: With regard to the visit of President Jiang, again there has been a lot of speculation about the question of an apology from Japan. I am sure you are still discussing it, but could you say what kind of direction the talks are heading in as far as the kind of apology Japan might be able to give related to more than what has been said in the newspapers?

   Mr. Okada: Here again, it is not so very appropriate to give you any sort of preview. At the moment, we are still making preparations for the visit. Concerning the Japanese attitude to the wartime, we have already made many statements and our position is clear to everybody. We have no intention to change it and we think that our stance to this is very clear already.

   Therefore, based on those statements or explanations we made already, including the statement made by then-Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama in 1995, we are going to coordinate with the Chinese side on how we can handle this issue.

   Q: In the case of South Korea and President Kim Dae Jung's visit -- based on what Mr. Murayama said in the past -- but Prime Minister Obuchi just said it specifically about South Korea.

   Mr. Okada: Yes.

   Q: I think Mr. Murayama did not specify.

   Mr. Okada: That is true.

   Q: He said a general kind of statement of regret. Is it likely that there will be a specific reference to China this time?

   Mr. Okada: I think that is a very good understanding of yours. That is one precedent on which we should also reflect upon. We understand that what we told to President Kim Dae Jung of the Republic of Korea was in line with what we had already announced or explained before that. We elaborated it for the sake of bilateral relations.

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