Japanese PM meets Trump; confident of building trust

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has expressed confidence in building trust with US president-elect Donald Trump after a meeting at the Trump Towers in Manhattan on Thursday.

Abe, the first global leader to meet with the republican president-elect, told reporters that he had ‘candid’ talks with Trump in a ‘warm atmosphere’, although he did not give much details about their meeting which he said was unofficial.

“I am not going to dive into details or specifics of our today’s discussion with President-elect Trump, however I do believe that without trust the alliance (between our two nations) will never function, and as an outcome of today’s discussion I am convinced that Mr. Trump is a leader with who can be trusted,” Abe said.

Trump had caused concern in Asia when he said during the campaign that allies in the east would have to pay more for help from US forces.

After the meeting which was attended by Trump’s daughter Ivanka and her husband Jared Kushner, Shinzo Abe said he is convinced Trump will maintain their alliance.

“As an outcome of today’s meeting and discussion, I renewed my conviction that together with Mr. Trump I will be able to establish a relationship of trust. Also with regard of the content of discussion I want to tell you that I conveyed my basic views on various issues to Mr. Trump,” the Japanese premier said.

He added that “we shared the view with Mr. Trump that we will have another occasion at a mutually convenient time for our deeper discussion to to cover wider range of issues.”

A day before the meeting, Japanese officials said they had no idea exactly when the meeting would take place, where in New York it would happen, who would be invited or whom to call for answers.