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As China overtook the United States to be Japan's second largest trading partner in 2004, it is very hopeful that the trade volume between Japan and China will top US$200 in 2005, said Yoshio Nakata, board chairman of the Japanese Council for the Promotion of International Trade (JCPIT) in an interview with People's Daily during his visit in Beijing.

Mr. Nakata introduced three major principles of the council's work this year: first, to push forward the mutually complementary and beneficial economic and trade cooperation between the two countries and promote their common development; second, boost the improvement of the cross-border political relations; third, promote regional economic cooperation in East Asia.

Mr. Nakata said, Japan and China have made much headway in their economic and trade cooperation as the bilateral trade has taken up 20 percent of Japan's total. China's development and economy have started to have direct impacts on Japan and its enterprises. Nearly 33 years have passed since the normalization of Japan-China relations, now under new circumstances and structural changes, obstacles have arisen in the politics and diplomatic relations between the two countries, particularly major ones such as Japanese Prime Minister's visits to the Yasukuni Shrine.

He added that it is the responsibility and obligation of Japan, China and the Republic of advance the economic cooperation in Asia, which is hard to be materialized should there be no sincere collaboration between Japan and China. Therefore the two countries should make concerted efforts to deepen the trust between their peoples.