PREVIEW: Trump’s China summit, trade agreements and Iran on the agenda as Takaichi heads to Washington

Record ID: 2365572

  • Title: PREVIEW: Trump’s China summit, trade agreements and Iran on the agenda as Takaichi heads to Washington
  • Date: 16th March 2026
  • Summary: SPRINGFIELD, VIRGINIA, UNITED STATES (MARCH 15, 2026) (REUTERS) (SOUNDBITE)(ENGLISH) SENIOR DIRECTOR AT THE INSTITUTE FOR INDO-PACIFIC SECURITY (IIPS), YUKI TATSUMI, SAYING:  “This [The Iran war], like you mentioned, has a significant impact on Japanese economy at the time when Prime Minister Takaichi is desperately trying to deliver something that she promised to the vote
  • Embargoed:
  • Keywords: China Golden Dome Japan Sanae Takaichi Trump Xi Yuki Tatsumi oil prices tariffs
  • Location: VARIOUS
  • City: VARIOUS
  • Country: US
  • Topics: Diplomacy/Foreign Policy,North America,Government/Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA009382213032026RP1
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text: The war in Iran is likely to feature prominently in talks between Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi and U.S. President Donald Trump this week in Washington, shaking up the agenda for the long-planned summit, an analyst told Reuters. 
    Takaichi, who met with Trump in Japan in October of last year, wanted to time the meeting for after her party’s sweeping election victory in February, Yuki Tatsumi, Senior Director of the Institute for Indo-Pacific Security Studies (IIPS) said on Sunday (March 15). 
    But the U.S.-Israeli attack on Iran and subsequent disruption to oil supplies that have hit Japan hard, have complicated Takaichi’s carefully planned “set of deliverables”. 
    One that is still high on the agenda will be to make sure she conveys Japan and its neighbors' concerns to Trump ahead of his meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping at the end of March. 
    “There were a lot of concerns that maybe he offers to turn blind eye against Beijing's continued aggressiveness toward Taiwan or East China Sea or South China Sea, none of which is in Japan's interest,” Tatsumi said. So Takaichi wants to make sure Trump “will not make a deal with China at the expense of, not just Japan's own interest, but then also other allies and partners in the region's interest,” she added.
    Japan is heavily dependent on oil from the Middle East with the war disrupting supllies from the Gulf’s Strait of Hormuz. Takaichi’s government plans to start releasing oil from its stockpiles on Monday to soften the shock. 
    Takaichi may be put on the spot by Trump’s request for U.S. allies to deploy warships to escort ships through the Strait, Tatsumi said. But she may instead offer Japanese minesweepers to clear the critical waterway.
    “When Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1991, after the hostility ended, Japan's minesweeper went out and cleared the mines,” she said. “So that's something that she might offer instead… that is definitely more politically palatable to play in the Japanese domestic context.”
    Takaichi will also hope to build on a trade deal agreed last year and flesh out Japan's $550-billion U.S. investment pledge. 
    Japan has sought assurances from the U.S. that Tokyo will not be put at a disadvantage under Washington's latest tariff measures, urging that a potential 15% tariff not be applied to Japanese goods, its trade minister said earlier this month.
    After the U.S. Supreme Court knocked down some of Trump's key tariffs in February, the U.S. imposed a new 10% blanket levy that could rise to 15%, generating new global uncertainty about the trade deals struck last year and the tariff rates importers now face.
    Japan will also reportedly join Trump’s "Golden Dome" missile defense initiative, a move Tatsumi says addresses Japan’s concerns about ballistic missiles form China, Russia, Iran and North Korea. 
    “So this actually does benefit Japan's own defense,” she said, “but then also, tangentially, by participating in this, it also is a nice way to play to one of the President Trump's major initiatives.” 
    (Production: Ashraf Fahim)
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