President Jokowi Invited to Celebrate Indonesia-Japan 60th Anniversary Celebration

Jakarta, MINA – Indonesia’s President Joko Widodo has been invited by Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe to celebrate the 60th anniversary of diplomatic relations between the two countries which will fall in 2018, reports Indonesia’s Antara news agency.

Plan to celebrate close relations between the two countries which have been established since 1958 had been discussed between President Jokowi and Abe during a bilateral meeting ahead of the East Asia Summit Leaders’ Retreat in Manila early November.

“In a Japanese way they agreed on the importance of high level exchange which implies that we expect the presence of the President (Jokowi) next year. We are now working on it,” Japanese ambassador to Indonesia Masafumi Ishii told Antara in Jakarta on Thursday.

In the last 60 years, relations between Indonesia and Japan have been improving very well, with Jokowi having met seven times with Abe since taking office in 2014.

Japan’s investment in Indonesia reached almost 90 percent in 2016 while the index of doing business in Indonesia jumped from 114th position in 2015 to 72 in 2017.

Meanwhile, Abe expressed his appreciation that Jokowi has managed to improve investment climate in Indonesia.

The two leaders also talked about the progress of many cooperation projects going on between the two countries.

According to Ishii, the Indonesia-Japan relations cover not only economy or politics and security, but also the people-to-people relations at grassroots level.

As both countries are welcoming their 60th anniversary of diplomatic relations, the challenge would be to use the opportunity to look forward, to talk more about future cooperation which will be really constructive for the future generations, he said.

“The two leaders agreed that next year is a very important momentum for the two countries to promote relations into the higher level,” Ishii noted. (T/RS5/RS1)

Mi’raj Islamic News Ageny (MINA)