Politics
The leaders of China and Japan have met for formal talks after more than two years of severe tension over a territorial dispute. The BBC writes:
Chinese President Xi Jinping and Japanese PM Shinzo Abe met on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation (Apec) summit in Beijing.
The talks are the first between the two leaders.
Mr Abe said it was the first step to "improving ties". Relations have been soured by the row over islands in the East China Sea.
The strategically important islands, known as Diaoyu by China and Senkaku by Japan, are controlled by Japan.
Tokyo's decision to purchase three of them from their private Japanese owner in September 2012 led to an escalation in a dispute that has rumbled quietly for years.
During the 30-minute meeting, Abe said he asked his Chinese counterpart to establish a hotline aimed at preventing clashes at sea, after frequent sparring between paramilitary vessels in the waters around the islands disputed by both countries. Aljazeera reports:
Both Chhina and Japan claim ownership of a tiny group of uninhabited islets in the East China Sea, called the Senkaku by Japan and Diaoyu by China. Last Friday, China and Japan agreed to work on improving ties, paving the way for their leaders to meet on the sidelines of the summit. The two countries acknowledged on Friday they held different views on the territorial dispute.
Beijing has also been particularly angered by visits by Japanese government ministers, including Abe, to the Yasukuni Shrine, which China sees as a symbol of Japan's past militarism and occupation. Yasukuni honours millions of war dead, including wartime leaders convicted as war criminals by an Allied tribunal.
As a condition for the meeting, China, which has painted Abe as a dangerous historical revisionist, had reportedly been demanding that he swear not to repeat a visit to Yasukuni.
It has also been calling for Japan to acknowledge the existence of a dispute over the Tokyo-controlled islands, where paramilitary vessels from both sides have sparred over recent years.
