The summit, held in Lee’s hometown in North Gyeongsang Province, marks the leaders’ third bilateral meeting in just seven months — an unusually rapid pace for Seoul-Tokyo diplomacy given the historical baggage that has long complicated ties between the two U.S. allies.
Takaichi departed Tokyo’s Haneda Airport earlier Tuesday for the two-day visit, which is expected to center heavily on energy security as instability in the Middle East threatens oil shipping lanes and adds fresh pressure to Asian economies heavily dependent on imported crude.
At the top of the agenda is a proposed “industrial and trade policy dialogue,” which Japanese media reported the two governments are expected to formally launch after the summit. The framework would aim to coordinate responses to disruptions in crude oil and refined petroleum supplies, including possible emergency lending of fuel such as jet oil during shortages.
The two countries are also expected to discuss joint crude procurement, transport coordination and ways to avoid export restrictions during supply crises — a sign that Seoul and Tokyo increasingly view energy security as a shared strategic vulnerability rather than a purely commercial issue.
The urgency has intensified as the prolonged Middle East conflict threatens one of Northeast Asia’s most critical economic chokepoints. Both South Korea and Japan remain overwhelmingly dependent on imported energy transported through the Strait of Hormuz.
The leaders are also expected to expand discussions into broader economic security issues tied to artificial intelligence, semiconductors and supply chains, areas both governments have increasingly framed as part of national security policy.
Lee and Takaichi first met on the sidelines of the APEC summit in Gyeongju in October last year shortly after Takaichi took office as Japan’s first female prime minister. They met again in January in Nara, Takaichi’s political hometown, where discussions focused on AI, economic resilience, defense and transnational crime.
Defense cooperation is also expected to re-emerge as a major theme.
Lee and Takaichi are likely to agree on resuming humanitarian search-and-rescue exercises between the South Korean Navy and Japan’s Maritime Self-Defense Force next month. The drills, known as SAREX, were conducted regularly between 1999 and 2017 before being suspended following a diplomatic dispute in 2018 involving a Japanese patrol aircraft and a South Korean naval vessel.
If the exercises resume, they would mark the first bilateral naval drills between the two countries in nearly a decade and underscore the broader thaw in practical security cooperation as North Korea accelerates its weapons programs and China expands its regional military influence.
The two leaders are also expected to exchange views on the recent U.S.-China summit after U.S. President Donald Trump reportedly briefed both governments following his May 14-15 talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
The Andong meeting also carries symbolic weight. Takaichi hosted Lee in Nara earlier this year, and Lee is now returning the gesture in his own hometown — a deliberate effort to normalize leader-level exchanges after years of diplomatic volatility.
Despite unresolved historical disputes rooted in Japan’s 1910-45 colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula, both governments have increasingly prioritized pragmatic cooperation as geopolitical and economic risks intensify across the region.
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