Japan's New Diplomacy

Time via RCP.

Interesting article about the visit of India's Prime Minister Singh to Japan, and the special treatment he is being accorded there, addressing the Japanese Diet (legislature). Japan is looking beyond its relationship with the US for perhaps the first time since WW2. Japanese PM Abe is cultivating India as a potential diplomatic counterweight to China.

"Deepening ties between the two biggest democracies in Asia is part of Abe's efforts to chart a new direction for Japan's foreign policy, one less consumed with the U.S. and more embracing of Asia"

Although bilateral trade between the two nations is not yet significant, it is growing pretty rapidly. Japanese investment is still concentrated on China, but Japanese automakers are eyeing the Indian market, and India's software companies could begin to make inroads into the Japanese markets as well.