Wang spoke highly of the great significance of President Hu Jintao’s state visit to Japan in May and his presence in the Outreach Session of the Group of Eight Summit in Japan in pushing forward China-Japan relationships.

He said the CPC is willing to work with LDP to seriously carry out the important consensus reached by the leaders of both countries and facilitate bilateral political mutual trust, in a bid to promote the Sino-Japanese strategic and reciprocal partnership.

Yamasaki Taku again expressed deep sympathy regarding China’s May 12 earthquake in southwest Sichuan Province and wished Beijing Olympic Games a complete success.

He said the Japanese government and the LDP both attached great importance to the development of China-Japan ties and is willing to promote the Japan-China relationship through party-to party exchange.

The two sides also exchanged in-depth views on such issues as the regional situation.

Some of my work suggests that it is indeed the economics that is driving the politics [full paper in pdf]. The economic relationship continues to boom and the countries are sorting out some of their differences. Some evidence of closer ties:

• A hawkish Abe visited Beijing on his first trip as PM
• The recent agreement on a gas exploration deal in the East China Sea, striking a compromise over a long-running bilateral row
• Japanese navy destroyer visiting China last month

Bloomberg has a piece on where some experts think the relationship is at.