TOKYO (Sputnik) — Yoshihide Suga told reporters that Russian President Vladimir Putin and Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe agreed in a phone call last week to continue bilateral dialogue.
"Now we are working to prepare President Putin’s visit to Japan due this year. As for the foreign minister’s visit, nothing is set in stone yet," Suga said Monday.
Earlier this day, Japan’s public broadcaster NHK quoted diplomatic sources as saying that Kishida would come to Moscow in August or September of this year. This was allegedly proposed by Abe during his phone conversation with Putin.
Putin was to travel to Tokyo in 2014, but the start of a crisis in Ukraine strained relations between Russia and several other nations, forcing the president to put off the trip until next year.
