On February 21, 2008, visiting Chinese State Councilor Tang Jiaxuan met in Tokyo respectively with Japan's House of Representatives Speaker Yohei Kono, President of Japan's House of Councilors Satsuki Eda, Chairman of the Japanese Communist Party (JCP) Kazuo Shii, and Chair of Social Democratic Party of Japan Fukushima Mizuho.

Tang appreciated Kono and Eda for their continued commitment to the Sino-Japanese friendship. China firmly sticks to the foreign policy of treating neighbors well and as partners and has always attached great importance to Sino-Japanese good-neighborly friendship. This year marks the 30th anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Peace and Friendship between China and Japan and is also the Beijing Olympics year. Tang said the upcoming visit by Chinese President Hu Jintao to Japan scheduled in spring and the holding of the Sino-Japanese Youths Friendly Exchange Year will be important opportunities for further developing the bilateral ties. The Chinese side is willing to make efforts with all circles in Japan, including the Japanese parliament, to implement agreements reached by leaders from the two countries and to push for further development of the Sino-Japanese mutual beneficial ties based on common strategic interests.

The state councilor highly praised the establishment of a committee supporting the Beijing Olympics within the Japanese parliament, and invited Japanese people to watch Olympic Games in Beijing. Tang also thanked for the sympathy expressed and the donations made by the Japanese parliament members for the snow havoc in the southern parts of China.

Kono said the Japanese parliament is happy to see the improvement of the relationship between Japan and China and warmly welcomes President Hu Jintao's Japan visit. The Japanese parliament will continue to dedicate to the bilateral friendly cooperation and wishes the Beijing Olympics success.

Eda said the exchanges between Japan and China, as close neighbors, go back to ancient times and China's development is an opportunity to Japan and the world at large. Japan should work with China to develop their friendly relations, properly deal with historical questions and strengthen cooperation of mutual benefit.

Tang appreciated the JCP and the Social Democratic Party of Japan for contributing to the development of Sino-Japanese friendship. He emphasized that China will stick to the road of peaceful development and an open strategy based upon mutual benefits and win-win results, as it creates favorable conditions for China to develop friendly cooperation with all other countries including Japan. China attaches importance to ties with the two parties and is ready to strengthen exchanges and cooperation with them in the new situation, to push for long-term healthy and stable development of Sino-Japanese relations.

Kazuo Shii and Fukushima Mizuho said their parties were eagerly looking forward to President Hu's upcoming visit to Japan and were ready to make unremitting efforts for promoting Japan-China relations. They also wished the Beijing Olympics great success. Shii said this year marks the 10th anniversary of the normalization of the relations between the Japanese Communist Party (JCP) and the Communist Party of China (CPC), adding that both parties are ready to take this opportunity to strengthen party-to-party exchanges and cooperation. Mizuho said the Social Democratic Party stands for advancing the realization of peace and stability in northeast Asia and hopes to keep contact and cooperation with the Chinese side in this regard.