International News

NEW YORK, (MILLAT+APP/AFP) – Japan’s Shinzo Abe
sat down Thursday with Donald Trump, becoming the first foreign leader to meet the US president-elect as he works to shape a cabinet that may include both staunch backers and former rivals.
The Japanese prime minister flew into New York to chat with the
billionaire at his Manhattan skyscraper as Trump met with a steady stream of operatives from his Republican Party as he prepares to take office on January 20.
Officials from both sides confirmed the meeting at Trump Tower had
begun.
Abe, a defense hawk who is in a strong political position at home,
was likely to sound out Trump on issues from Asian security to trade.
Japan is one of Washington’s closest allies but Trump alarmed Tokyo
policymakers during the campaign by musing about pulling the thousands of US
troops from the region and suggesting that officially pacifist Japan may need nuclear weapons.
Trump also vowed during the election to tear up the Trans-Pacific
Partnership, a proposed vast trade pact backed by outgoing President Barack
Obama and which Abe had made a top priority.
Trump’s former campaign manager Kellyanne Conway said Trump and
incoming vice president Mike Pence looked forward to meeting the Japanese leader.
But she told CBS television: “Any deeper conversations about policy
and the relationship between Japan and the United States will have to wait until after the inauguration.”
Obama, who has refrained from overt criticism of his successor since
the election, was wrapping his final visit to Europe in Berlin — where some commentators saw him as passing the torch as the world’s champion of liberal democracy to German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
Trump separately met with Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama and hinted
that he would offer a prime position to the Republican, one of the earliest supporters of Trump’s once longshot campaign who shares the 70-year-old billionaire’s antipathy to immigration.
The tycoon in a statement said he was “unbelievably impressed” with
Sessions but had not yet made decisions on his cabinet.