Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and South Korean President Moon Jae-in agreed when they met Tuesday in Chengdu, China, that their governments should maintain diplomatic dialogue to resolve the disputes that have disrupted bilateral relations over the past year — even though they remained far apart on the thorny issue of Koreans mobilized as wartime laborers for Japanese businesses.

Still, it was progress in itself that Abe and Moon held their first formal talks since September 2018. In the absence of summit diplomacy during these past 15 months, Tokyo-Seoul relations nose-dived to what is deemed their worst since the two nations normalized diplomatic ties in 1965. They emphasized the importance of restoring ties between the two countries as close neighbors that share national security interests. If the two governments believe so, they need to follow up on the Abe-Moon talks to keep up the dialogue and stop bilateral ties from spiraling further downward.

In the lead-up to resuming the top-level diplomacy, held on the sidelines of the trilateral summit among the leaders of Japan, China and South Korea, Seoul put on hold its earlier decision to terminate the General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA) with Japan, while Tokyo partially eased its tightened control on exports to South Korea of materials crucial for semiconductor production. Abe stressed the importance of close coordination between the two countries — and with their mutual ally, the United States — on regional security challenges, while Moon hailed the two nations as the closest neighbors geographically, historically and culturally.