JAPAN / FILE: Japan says the country has reached an agreement with China to jointly develop and share profits from gas fields in the East China Sea

Record ID: 343553

  • Title: JAPAN / FILE: Japan says the country has reached an agreement with China to jointly develop and share profits from gas fields in the East China Sea
  • Date: 18th June 2008
  • Summary: (BN10) TOKYO, JAPAN (JUNE 18, 2008) (REUTERS) EXTERIOR OF MINISTRY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS IN JAPAN JAPANESE FOREIGN MINISTER MASAHIKO KOMURA AND TRADE MINISTER AKIRA AMARI WALKING INTO A NEWS CONFERENCE (SOUNDBITE) (Japanese) MASAHIKO KOMURA, JAPANESE FOREIGN MINISTER, SAYING: "Upon completion of official discussions, Japan and China have made a political agreement to cooper
  • Embargoed: 3rd July 2008 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: International Relations,Energy
  • Reuters ID: LVA142B4G1MCMV45WJHTHH4GZXV7
  • Story Text: Japan on Wednesday (June 18) announced that it had reached agreement with China on a festering sea gas dispute, easing one volatile row between the two Asian powers.

    "Upon completion of official discussions, Japan and China have made a political agreement to cooperate in the East China Sea," said Japanese Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura at a news conference in Tokyo, adding that the agreement did not "harm the respective legal stances of both sides."
    China also issued a statement on Wednesday (June 18) confirming the deal with Japan, but in an earlier statement on Tuesday (June 17), the country's spokeswoman said that the development did not compromise the country's claims in the East China Sea or the Chunxiao gas field, adding that it has nothing to do with the joint development.

    "Japanese companies are going to take a stake in the area, where China has been developing. So whether we call it a "joint development" or not is not an important issue to us," said Komura when a repoter asked whether the project was to be a "joint development".
    China and Japan, seeking to ease years of antagonism, much of it springing from Japan's brutal 1931-45 invasion and occupation of parts of China, announced at a May summit that they were close to resolving the gas dispute.
    Estimated known reserves in the disputed fields are a modest 92 million barrels of oil equivalent -- around three weeks of energy demand in Japan -- but both countries have pursued the issue as there may be a lot more yet to be found.
    The dispute has come to symbolise more than an argument over maritime gas rights between the two energy-hungry countries because it concerns matters of territory and sovereignty.
    The two sides have put those fraught issues to one side to cement the deal to jointly develop the gas fields.
    The agreement calls for the two countries to jointly explore for oil and gas in a disputed part of the sea, and also allows Japanese companies to take a stake in China's development of the Chunxiao gas field, on the Chinese side of the median line that Japan claims as the sea boundary.
    co/jrc
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