• South China Sea dispute: full coverage

Tokyo: Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Chinese Premier Li Keqiang met on the sidelines of an international meeting in Mongolia as Asia's two largest economies try to repair a relationship fractured after Japan sided with the West in the South China Sea dispute.

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Beijing slams international ruling

The Chinese government has issued a white paper saying it will not recognise or enforce an international ruling on disputed territories in the South China Sea. Vision courtesy ABC News 24.

Earlier this week, China warned Japan to stop intervening on theSouth China Sea issue after an international court rejected China's claims to more than 80 per cent of the waters.

Liu Zhenmin, a vice-minister for foreign affairs, accused a former Japanese president of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea of manipulating "the entire proceedings" behind the ruling. Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida responded on Friday, saying there was no problem with the Japanese judge's involvement, Kyodo News reported.

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"China sees the West as trying to obstruct its development," said Bonji Ohara, a research fellow at The Tokyo Foundation think tank and a former military attache in Beijing. "They see Japan as acting on behalf of the West to thwart China. So it's hard for China to seek better relations."

Eight months since the last meeting between Abe and Li, a failure to ease animosities not only threatens Japan's biggest trading relationship, but increases the risk of a military clash over rival claims to uninhabited islands in the East China Sea. Japanese fighter jets scrambled against Chinese jets nearing its airspace a record 199 times in the April-June period, an increase of 85 on the same period last year.

After the Hague tribunal issued its ruling on the South China Sea on Tuesday, Japan's Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida angered China by releasing a statement underscoring the tribunal's verdict as "final and legally binding" on the parties to the dispute.For Abe it could also mean that what seemed like a diplomatic coup 18 months ago has slipped through his fingers. Then, the two countries issued a statement acknowledging differences of opinion over ownership of the East China Sea islands before a summit between Abe and President Xi Jinping.

Workers chat near a map of South China Sea on display at a maritime defence educational facility in Nanjing, showing the nine-dash line claiming most of the area for China.  Photo: Chinatopix/AP

"Japan strongly expects that the parties' compliance with this award will eventually lead to the peaceful settlement of disputes in the South China Sea," Kishida said, adding that Japan has "consistently advocated the importance of the rule of law and the use of peaceful means, not the use of force or coercion" in settling maritime disputes.

While China's main focus may be on its loss of face in the Hague, sparring over the disputed islands in the East China Sea has also intensified, with China alleging that two Japanese fighter aircraft had "provoked" Chinese fighters in June as they patrolled China's self-declared air defense identification zone -- an allegation Japan has denied.

A restaurant worker puts up a banner which partly reads: "South China Sea is China's territory" in Beijing. Photo: AP

Also in June, a Chinese warship was spotted in the contiguous zone outside Japanese-administered waters around the disputed islands. While Chinese coastguard ships frequently sail right into what Japan sees as its territorial waters, no military vessel had previously been seen there.

One reason the improvement in ties did not take root is that the Abe administration doesn't have anyone who can communicate effectively with the Xi administration, said Noriyuki Kawamura, a professor at Nagoya University of Foreign Studies. As a result, no one has been able to fathom the reasons for its behavior, he said, adding that Japan's new ambassador to Beijing will also need time to develop relations.

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, right, and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe shake hands during a bilateral meeting held on Friday. Photo: Kyodo News/AP

The next opportunity for a top-level meeting will likely be the Group of 20 talks to be hosted by China in September. Ohara said the meeting would be an important not only for bilateral ties between China and Japan.

"I think China will use this as a platform to express its dissatisfaction with what it sees as obstruction of its development by the West and Japan," Ohara said. "China is saying it won't play by the West's rules," he added. "To get along with China in international society, we have to play the same game as them. That means we have to have the same rules and we need to start working those out as soon as possible."

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, left, speaks to Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, right, during a bilateral meeting held on the sideline of the 11th Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) Summit in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. Photo: Kyodo News/AP

Bloomberg