Japan, China and South Korea trilateral summit postponed until 2017

Japan, which was scheduled to host an annual trilateral summit with China and South Korea, has announced that the meet has been postponed. Although it citied "various factors" as the reason for postponing the meet, reports suggest that the impeachment of South Korean President Park Geun-hye was the primary issue.

South Korea's parliament voted to impeach Park over a corruption scandal on 9 December following weeks of protests.

On Tuesday (13 December), Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida said, "We decided to re-arrange it and hold the summit at an appropriate time next year." He added that the trilateral meeting is extremely important and said "we hope to convene it is as soon as possible".

The annual trilateral summit this year was scheduled to be held in Tokyo on 19 and 20 December. It would have provided an opportunity for Park and Chinese Premier Li Keqiang to visit Japan for the first time since the two took office in 2013.

All the three countries have been holding the summit since 2008, but the meet was not held in 2013 and 2014 due to strained relations between China and Japan. Last year Seoul had held the summit.

Leaders of the three nations met in 2015, marking the first trilateral summit since 2012.

Meanwhile, Tokyo officially announced that Russian President Vladimir Putin would visit the country on 15 December. Putin will arrive at Yamaguchi prefecture and will hold a meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in the city of Nagato.

The two heads of state will hold talks the following day in Tokyo and would later address a joint press conference.