World

ABOARD THE USS THEODORE ROOSEVELT — Defence Secretary Ashton Carter on Thursday visited a US aircraft carrier in the South China Sea, where he took a jab at Chinese actions that have been blamed for raising tension in the disputed waterway.

Carter flew to the USS Roosevelt — an enormous, nuclear-powered supercarrier — as it churned through international waters about 150-200 nautical miles south of where China is constructing artificial islands to underpin its expansive claims to the region.

"There's a lot of concern about Chinese behaviour out here," Carter said aboard the ship.

He described the vessel's presence as "a sign of the critical role that United States military power plays in what is a very consequential region for the American future".

Washington and Beijing are engaged in a big-power face-off over the Chinese island-building programme.

China's expansion of tiny islets — some of which were previously mere reefs — has included runways, fuelling concerns of a future Chinese military presence far out into a sea that is a vital conduit for world trade.

The US has called for a halt to any island reclamation and said freedom of navigation must be preserved.

Carter arrived on the ship on an Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft and spent about three hours speaking to sailors on the floating military airport, which has a crew of about 5,500.

He harkened back to the aircraft carrier's presidential namesake in stressing that the US was in the region to stay, and that China should become "part of the security system of Asia and not to stand apart from it". 

'Carry a big stick' 

"Theodore Roosevelt's motto was 'speak softly but carry a big stick' — speak softly means talk to other people, see what we can do to reach an agreement," Carter said.

"This is a region that has enjoyed stability for a long time. It would be a shame if people ruined that, and I don't expect that to occur."

China's claims to almost all of the South China Sea are widely disputed. 

Malaysia, the Philippines, Vietnam, Brunei and Taiwan also have various claims, some overlapping, though none are as extensive as Beijing's.

The body of water has long been viewed as a potential flashpoint, and the Chinese island-building has heightened those fears.

Carter's visit came more than a week after Washington sent the guided missile destroyer USS Lassen to within several nautical miles of some of Beijing's man-made islands in the Spratlys chain.

The move was intended to press Washington's assertion that it has freedom of passage, but it angered China, which considers the area to be its territorial waters.

On Thursday, the USS Lassen pulled to within 500 metres of the USS Roosevelt's starboard side, and its captain, Commander Robert Francis, was helicoptered over to speak to reporters. 

He said the USS Lassen had sailed to within about 10 kilometres of the islets in an area called Subi Reef — close enough to see "a bunch of cranes and ships and very low-lying land features".

The USS Lassen was shadowed by a Chinese destroyer for about 10 days, and the two ships frequently exchanged "cordial" radio messages, he said.

"They did do their standard queries, to the nature of, 'hey, you are in Chinese waters. What is your intention? We want to make sure there is no misunderstanding,'" Francis recalled. 

The US ship's response was that it was "operating within international law", he added. On Tuesday, Carter and China's Defence Minister Chang Wanquan held a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of a regional defence dialogue in Kuala Lumpur.

Carter told Chang that the US would continue to "fly, sail and operate wherever international law allows", including the South China Sea, according to US officials.

A day later, the regional dialogue ended on a sour note as the US and China butted heads over whether a final joint statement should mention the South China Sea. No statement was issued.

GENEVA — Refugees and migrants are likely to keep coming to Europe at a rate of up to 5,000 per day via Turkey this winter, the United Nations said on Thursday, meaning that more than a million people will have fled to the continent this year.

About 760,000 people have already crossed the Mediterranean in 2015, mainly to Greece and Italy, after fleeing wars in Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as conflicts in Africa.

"We need to prepare for the possibility of up to 5,000 to continue arriving every day from now until February next year. If that is the case, we are looking at another 600,000 refugees and migrants arriving in Europe between November this year and February next year," William Spindler, spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), told Reuters Television.

"It will put the figure over a million for this year."

In 2014, 216,000 people arrived in Europe by sea seeking asylum, a number matched by those arriving this October alone.

"If we don't take the necessary action, we fear that more people will die because... of the harsh conditions of winter in Europe. We have already seen a number of shipwrecks off Greece and we are afraid that people might also die from exposure on the way between Greece and central and northern Europe," Spindler said.

More than 3,400 migrants have died trying to reach Europe this year by sea. On Thursday, one child drowned and another was missing off the Greek island of Kos after a boat carrying migrants sank, the coastguard said.

‘Europe not dealing with crisis’

UNHCR is providing aid at over 40 sites in Greece, including 20 islands and islets, among them the main destination, Lesbos.

It is seeking an additional $96.15 million to support Croatia, Greece, Serbia, Slovenia and Macedonia, bringing the total amount that it is trying to raise for Europe's biggest refugee crisis since World War II to $172.7 million.

Spindler criticised the failure of the European Union's member states to agree a comprehensive response.

"Europe has the means to deal with this situation but is not dealing with it," he said. "And now, aid agencies such as UNHCR and others are having to come to Europe to respond."

The fresh funds will be used to upgrade shelter and reception facilities for winter conditions, and to supply family tents and housing units equipped with heating.

Sanitation and water supply systems will be improved to provide hot showers, toilets, and laundry facilities. Transport may be provided if national authorities are unable to do so, to avoid people having to walk in the cold to reach registration points.

Winter clothing, thermal blankets, boots, socks, raincoats and head lamps will be distributed, a UNHCR statement said.

It urged donor states to allocate funds "as flexibly as possible" as the routes taken by the refugees were continually changing.

ATHENS — The first refugees left Greece on Wednesday under an EU relocation plan, but Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras warned they were a "drop in the ocean" as the number of illegal migrant entries surged to 800,000 this year.

The six Syrian and Iraqi families, who are starting new lives in Luxembourg, are the first to be relocated from Greece under plans to share out nearly 160,000 migrants across the bloc in a scheme fiercely opposed by some EU members.

Tsipras, who was at Athens Airport to see the 30 refugees off, said they were making "a trip to hope", but warned their numbers were nothing compared to the hundreds of thousands who have arrived on European shores this year.

"Today they have the opportunity to make a trip to hope, to a better life," said Tsipras, who was joined at the airport by Luxembourg's Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn.

"It's a drop in the ocean, but we hope the drop will become a stream and then a river of humanity."

He spoke as Fabrice Leggeri, the head of the EU's Frontex border agency, told Germany's Bild newspaper that migrants have made some 800,000 "illegal entries" to the bloc so far this year and warned that the influx has probably not "reached its peak".

The need for a solution to Europe's worst migration crisis since World War II is becoming increasingly urgent, with at least 80 migrants — many of them children — dying in the last week while trying to cross from Turkey to Greece in rough weather.

"It's these flights that should be routine, not shipwrecks," Greece's deputy immigration minister Ioannis Mouzalas said as the refugees flew out from Athens.

On Tuesday four more migrants, including two children, drowned after their boat got into difficulty off the Greek island of Lesbos.

In Germany, Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen announced that more than 6,000 soldiers have been mobilised to manage the influx into a country that is expected to take in up to a million asylum seekers this year.

This is more German troops than are deployed abroad, she noted.

"The human sacrifice that shames European civilisation must stop," said Tsipras, whose country saw more than 200,000 people land on its beaches in October alone, according to the UN refugee agency UNHCR.

Tsipras said the registration and relocation process for refugees must begin in Turkey, insisting: "Greece is not the gateway; Turkey is the gateway."

Ankara's cooperation is seen as key to ending the crisis, with the EU last month announcing a refugee cooperation deal with Turkey that includes a possible three billion euros ($3.3 billion) in aid.

Two first groups of Eritreans and Syrians left Italy under the relocation scheme last month, bound for Sweden and Finland, although some countries such as the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia and Poland still oppose the mandatory quotas.

A Greek asylum service official said the Iraqi and Syrian families leaving Athens on Wednesday, chosen because they are considered vulnerable, included 16 children — two of them disabled — and a pregnant woman.

On arrival in Luxembourg the families will spend two days in a registration centre and then up to three months in temporary accommodation. The welfare service will then help them to find permanent housing, schools and jobs.

Luxembourg's government said there would be no press activities on their arrival in the country, saying they "want to give them some privacy while they are starting their new life".

Several European countries have closed their borders in the midst of the migrant crisis, and on Tuesday Austria became the latest country to tout plans to tighten its asylum rules.

BUCHAREST — Romanian Prime Minister Victor Ponta quit on Wednesday, in a surprise move that will probably produce a new Cabinet led by a technocrat, after street protesters demanded resignations over a deadly fire in a Bucharest nightclub over the weekend.

Ponta is the country's only sitting premier to face a trial for corruption, and he was already under pressure to quit from the political opposition and President Klaus Iohannis, who defeated him in last November's presidential election.

Iohannis will consult political parties separately over the new premier starting Thursday and a possible nomination might emerge in the next days, he said.

"Last night, Romanians' outrage became true revolt," Iohannis said. "We can't believe that just a government change will solve Romania's problems. There is more to be done."

Ponta's departure might lead to a political realignment, although the coalition of three mainly leftist parties that form a majority in parliament showed no signs of a split. New elections are not due until December 2016.

After an emergency coalition meeting, their leader, Liviu Dragnea, said the priority was "to preserve stability" of the country. The next prime minister may not come from the party's ranks, Dragnea said.

"It would be very hard to propose and support a political person as prime minister anymore,” he said.

Iohannis, the former leader of the opposition Liberals, has said his aim is to bring his party to power. The constitution allows him to nominate a new premier, who then needs to win a vote of confidence in parliament.

Early elections appear unlikely, but still possible. They would be held only if parliament failed to approve two prime ministerial nominations by the president in votes of confidence within 60 days of the first nomination. No such snap poll has been held since the 1989 fall of communism.

Ponta stepped down to take responsibility for a fire in a nightclub on Friday night that had claimed the lives of 32 people by Tuesday and set off protests nationwide.

"I can carry any political battles, but I can't fight with the people," Ponta told reporters.

Angry about the way authorities grant permits and inspect public venues, protesters poured into the streets late into Tuesday night, carrying banners saying "Corruption Kills" and chanting "Murderers!" In Bucharest, about 25,000 people marched to government headquarters and the interior ministry on Tuesday.

"Victor Ponta is giving up his mandate," Dragnea told reporters in parliament. "Someone needs to assume responsibility for what has happened. This a serious matter and we promise a quick resolution of the situation."

Ponta had ignored all calls to step down after being indicted in September for forgery, money laundering and serving as an accessory to tax evasion during his time as a lawyer. He is likely to face his first court hearings later in November.

Defence Minister Mircea Dusa will take over as an interim leader to handle administrative work until a new government is voted in parliament.

The junior coalition party UNPR under Deputy Prime Minister Gabriel Oprea said in a statement on Wednesday that it was willing to keep supporting the coalition government.

"We back our coalition further and are available to create a new government majority alongside the PSD [Ponta's Social Democrat Party]," it said in the statement.

The UNPR's support ensures a parliamentary majority for the coalition government.

"We now think there will be a minority PSD Cabinet, potentially headed by a technocrat," said Otilia Dhand, an analyst at Teneo Intelligence, a New York-based political risk consultancy. "But I would only give that about a 40 per cent [probability] now. Thirty per cent for a Liberal minority Cabinet, and 30 per cent for early elections."

ING Romania's chief economist, Ciprian Dascalu, said: "To me, the most likely scenario seems a caretaker government until the general election, supported by a wide majority."

At 1530 GMT the leu had softened by 0.3 per cent on the day to 4.4455 against the euro, its lowest level since August 24, and debt yields rose by up to 10 basis points. 

BEIJING — The US military will continue to operate wherever international law allows, a top US admiral said in Beijing on Tuesday, a week after America infuriated China by sailing close to artificial islands it is building in the South China Sea.

"International seas and airspace belong to everyone and are not the dominion of any single nation," Admiral Harry Harris said at the Stanford Centre at Peking University.

"Our military will continue to fly, sail, and operate whenever and wherever international law allows. The South China Sea is not — and will not — be an exception," he added, according to a transcript.

Harris is the head of the US Pacific Command and his public declaration in the Chinese capital is a mark of US resolve over the waterway, where Beijing has built up rocks and reefs into artificial islands with facilities for military use.

Last week the US gave a practical demonstration of its policy, sailing the USS Lassen guided missile destroyer within 12 nautical miles of at least one of the land formations China claims in the disputed Spratly Islands.

Chinese officials rebuked Harris over the action, with the People's Liberation Army chief of general staff Fang Fenghui telling him it had "created a disharmonious atmosphere for our meeting and this is very regretful".

Foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told a regular briefing that Washington's call for Beijing to stop militarising the South China Sea while sending warships there itself was "an attempt to deprive China of its self-defence right as a sovereign state".

"It is a typical manifestation of hypocrisy and hegemonism," she said.

Washington says it takes no position on sovereignty disputes in the region and the sail-by was intended to protect freedom of navigation under international law, which it sees as potentially threatened by China's activities.

The USS Lassen's mission was part of the US's "routine freedom of navigation operations", Harris said in his speech, intended to "prevent the decomposition of international laws and norms".

Beijing claims sovereignty over almost the whole of the South China Sea on the basis of a segmented line that first appeared on Chinese maps in the 1940s.

The "ambiguous maritime claims" represented by China's "so-called nine-dash line" pose a challenge to navigation, Harris said.

The Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and Taiwan also have overlapping claims in the sea.

Washington has repeatedly said it does not recognise Chinese claims to territorial zones around the artificial islands.

The contretemps comes as the world's two largest military powers work to keep their cool over the troubled waters.

Harris made some conciliatory remarks, praising US-China ties and pointing out that Chinese and American ships were visiting ports in each other's countries.

"Some pundits predict a coming clash between our nations. I do not ascribe to this pessimistic view," Harris said.

Two days after the USS Lassen's voyage, the chief of US naval operations spoke with his Chinese counterpart via video. 

US officials said the call between Admiral John Richardson and Admiral Wu Shengli, who commands the Chinese navy, was "professional and productive".

But China's official Xinhua news agency paraphrased Wu as warning his counterpart of the risk of "a serious situation between frontline forces... or even a minor incident that could spark conflict".

Beijing's response to the USS Lassen sailing appears to have been carefully calibrated, with authorities expressing outrage, summoning US ambassador Max Baucus to protest, and saying they monitored and warned away the vessel — but without physically intervening.

China's position on the islands is leading many countries in the region "to want to intensify their security cooperation with the United States", US Defence Secretary Ashton Carter said on Sunday in South Korea.

The Pentagon chief was in Kuala Lumpur on Tuesday for meetings with regional partners as part of America's ongoing strategic "rebalance" towards the Asia-Pacific.

A key theme of the trip is likely to be Beijing's island-building and its wide-ranging sovereignty claims.

Mytilene, Greece — On a rocky beach on the Greek island of Lesbos where the bodies of drowned migrants wash up almost daily, exhausted rescue volunteers hold their heads in despair.

"The situation is crazy," says Essam Daod, a Palestinian doctor working with Israel-based humanitarian agency IsraAid. 

"There are thousands of migrants coming every day. We can't handle the situation," says the Haifa resident, who took unpaid leave so he and his wife could come and help out.

Lesbos lies on the frontline of a massive migration wave that has overwhelmed Europe, with over 700,000 people crossing the Mediterranean this year and thousands dying in the attempt.

Pressure on Greece began building in the summer but with the weather now rapidly deteriorating, sailing the Aegean Sea from neighbouring Turkey in ramshackle boats has become even more perilous for entire families fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East.

"The situation is getting worse because of the weather, there are strong winds," says Daod, who helped to save shipwrecked families, mostly Syrian, on the beach of Skala Sykaminias for three weeks.

Over 80 migrants, many them children, have died in Greek waters alone this past month according to an AFP count.

'Nightmares' 

"The purpose of coming here was to save lives and when you don't, you feel guilty, you have nightmares," says Daod, his voice cracking as he remembered a man he failed to revive.

"The water that comes out when we press their chest, it's something that chases me in nightmares all the time."

On other occasions, he could do nothing beyond saying a prayer for the dead on the beach.

"There is an emotional attachment with the people of my nation," he says, noting that many of the people he met were second-generation refugees from Palestine.

Working around the clock, many volunteers say prominent organisations have been conspicuously absent and that keeping vital supplies going is a daily struggle.

"There are not enough bottles of oxygen, there are only two ambulances. People are helping but there is not enough," says Daod, who unsuccessfully pushed his organisation to let him stay longer on the island. 

"I've seen one guy from the UN but no one else. There are just some tents and blankets given from the UN," the Palestinian medic says.

"I don't see any large NGOs that I would be used to seeing in the US, most of the people I've met came on their own," says Amy Shrodes, a 25-year-old American who was on her way to India when she decided to change trajectory after seeing disturbing images of desperate migrants risking their lives to find safety in Europe.

"I love to cook...to give them nutritious food that will help them on their journey, because they're going to have a long way to go," she adds.

The authorities on Lesbos have faced criticism since the summer for not doing enough to help the migrants.

But the island's Mayor Spyros Galinos says extensive amounts of money have been spent in trying to manage the enormous influx.

"How can a small island alone handle the daily arrival of 6,000 refugees?" he asks.

Of the 218,000 migrants and refugees who crossed the Mediterranean in October, 210,000 landed in Greece, mostly on Lesbos.

'Heaven for humanity'

Galinos said he would raise the issue with European Parliament chief Martin Schultz, who is expected to visit the island this week. 

"Refugees should not have to risk their lives, we should create a safe path for them to reach Europe," says Gerard Canals from the Spanish aid group ProActiva Open Arms.

The Spanish, who operate two jet skis, have been widely praised for helping the Greek coastguard keep up the rescue effort.

"The coastguard is overwhelmed, they cannot respond to all calls," says Canals.

But he adds that "the Greek state but mainly the European Union should do more" to provide resources.

Daod says that although he has gone hungry and sleepless, the experience has made him a better person.

"It's like heaven for humanity...everyone wants to help, everyone just put their lives aside and came here," he says. 

SEOUL — US Defence Secretary Ashton Carter and his South Korean counterpart vowed zero tolerance Monday for any North Korean provocations and agreed to strengthen combined defences against the myriad threats posed by Pyongyang.

Carter met Han Min-Koo in Seoul during an annual security meeting for the two allies to assess their military cooperation.

Carter told reporters they "spoke candidly" about nuclear weapons, ballistic missiles, cyber- and conventional military threats from North Korea, which they described as a risk to peace and security well beyond the Korean peninsula.

"The minister and the secretary reaffirmed that any North Korean aggression or military provocation is not to be tolerated," according to a joint statement after their talks.

They specifically voiced "grave concern" over strong hints from North Korea that it is preparing a long-range rocket launch in violation of US resolutions.

In a widely expected move, the defence chiefs signed an agreement that defines conditions for a transfer of control over the South Korean military from the United States to Seoul in time of war. 

South Korea had been scheduled to take wartime control, known as OPCON, by next year. But now the transfer is based on various conditions being met and not on a particular timeline.

North Korea's hostile rhetoric, rocket tests and unpredictable behaviour in recent years have prompted calls to postpone the transfer. The two nations agreed in principle last year to this "conditions-based" approach.

Carter said the main conditions Seoul must meet are the further development of its intelligence capabilities and its counter-artillery powers. 

"If we look at global trends in terms of national security, many countries in the world conduct self-defence in the form of cooperation with regional and local partners," Han said when asked why South Korea — despite its major economic and political clout — still was not ready to take control of its own military.

The defence chiefs also agreed to strengthen their capacity to deal with cyber attacks.

South Korea, one of the world's most wired nations, has blamed North Korean hackers for a series of cyber-attacks on military institutions, banks, government agencies, TV broadcasters and media websites in recent years. 

"We see the North Korean military challenge as continuing to evolve and becoming more complex and more challenging," a senior US defence official said after the meeting, speaking on condition of anonymity.

"Kim Jung-Un's regime has demonstrated a willingness to act provocatively, to use violence, to use force in ways that threaten the stability of the region."

Echoing comments Carter made about the strength of the US-South Korea alliance, the official said ties were at a high point.

"Ten years ago, there were serious disagreements between the two sides on some fundamental issues about the nature of the regime in North Korea," he said.

"The major issues in the alliance now... are fairly narrow issues about technology transfer and hypothetical contingency situations. We've come a long way."

Carter's visit to South Korea was his first international stop on an eight-day trip to the Asia-Pacific.

He will meet leaders from more than a dozen nations across East and South Asia. Officially, his mission is intended to help push the next phase of America's foreign policy "rebalance" to the region.

A key theme of the trip is likely to be China's construction of artificial islands in the South China Sea and its claims of sovereignty over almost the entire waterway.

The defence chiefs were asked about the issue during a news conference, with Han stressing that any conflict should be resolved "in the framework of international law".

Carter said Sunday the issue was leading many countries in the region "to want to intensify their security cooperation with the United States".

GENEVA — Being born with no nationality can cause children irreparable harm, the United Nations said Tuesday, estimating that a stateless child is born every 10 minutes, notably as a consequence of armed conflict. 

"In the short time that children get to be children, statelessness can set in stone grave problems that will haunt them throughout their childhoods and sentence them to a life of discrimination, frustration and despair," UN refugee agency chief Antonio Guterres said in a new report. 

The UNHCR report highlights consequences such as children being deprived of medical care, education and future access to employment.

"In countries hosting the 20 largest stateless populations, at least 70,000 stateless children are born each year" — or one about every 10 minutes, said the UNHCR, which is aiming to eliminate statelessness by 2024.

The report, to be launched by Guterres at the UN headquarters in New York on Wednesday, notes that in 30 countries national documentation is required to access basic medical treatment, while in 20 countries stateless children cannot even be vaccinated. 

The problem is particularly severe among migrants and refugees affected by conflict, the report said. 

In Syria, children can acquire nationality only through their fathers, but the four-year civil war has forced more than four million people to flee the country and left 25 per cent of refugee families fatherless. 

Women who fled Syria while pregnant told UN interviewers that their hopes of one day returning home with their families could be crushed without a birth certificate to prove that their children are Syrian. 

The UN agency proposed several measures to eliminate the scourge of statelessness, including the reform of discriminatory laws that prevent mothers from passing on nationality to their children. 

Children should also automatically become nationals of the country where they are born, UNHCR further said. 

The report identified discrimination as the main cause of statelessness, pointing to 20 countries where nationality can be denied on the basis of ethnicity, race or religion. 

In some countries, laws prohibiting such discrimination are ignored in practice, such as the Dominican Republic where people of Haitian descent have often been denied Dominican citizenship, UNHCR said. 

Globally, "several million children are watching their childhoods slip away without the sense of belonging and protection that comes with a nationality," the report said. 

GENEVA — The number of migrants and refugees entering Europe by sea last month was roughly the same as for the whole of 2014, United Nations refugee agency UNHCR said on Monday.

The monthly record of 218,394 also outstripped September's 172,843, UNHCR spokesman Adrian Edwards said.

"That makes it the highest total for any month to date and roughly the same as the entire total for 2014," he said. The UNHCR puts 2014 arrivals by sea at about 219,000.

"It also shows the just astonishing amount of arrivals in just a few days during the course of the month. The month peaked at 10,006 [arrivals in Greece alone] on a single day, on October 20."

The vast majority of refugees and migrants to Europe have travelled via Turkey to Greece, a switch from the previously more popular African route via Libya to Italy.

The top nationality are Syrian, accounting for 53 per cent of arrivals, as a result of the civil war that has driven hundreds of thousands from their homes.

Afghans come second, making up 18 per cent of the total.

The flow of refugees into Europe, however, is still dwarfed by the numbers in Syria's neighbours. Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan have Syrian refugee numbers exceeding 2 million, 1 million and 600,000 respectively.

UNHCR said in October that it was planning for up to 700,000 refugees in Europe this year and a similar or greater number in 2016.

But that plan has already been eclipsed, with 744,000 arriving so far. Some 3,440 are estimated to have died or gone missing in the attempt to escape to Europe.

Migration experts had expected the number of people making the hazardous journey by sea to dwindle as winter approached, but the boats have continued to arrive.

The Greek coastguard said on Monday that four refugees drowned and another six were missing off the Greek island of Farmakonisi after their boat sank.

Four people were rescued. Eleven people, including six infants, drowned on Sunday when their boat capsized off the island of Samos, trapping them in the cabin.

SEOUL — The leaders of South Korea, Japan and China pledged to work towards greater economic integration at their first joint meeting in over three years on Sunday, as they work to ease tensions stemming from Japan's wartime past.

South Korean President Park Geun-hye, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and Chinese Premier Li Keqiang also said they would to resume annual meetings which had been suspended since 2012 amid disagreements over history and territory.

Park said she agreed with Abe and Li to work towards the conclusion of a 16-nation free trade area as well as a separate three-way free trade deal that has been on the table since 2013.

"We agreed to work together for the conclusion of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership [RCEP]," Park told a joint news conference with Li and Abe after the summit.

"We agreed to expand economic and social cooperation for the mutual prosperity of Northeast Asia, and also to strengthen cooperation among the three countries to create new growth momentum."

China has been a key proponent of RCEP, which would create the world's biggest free trade bloc of 3.4 billion people.

Negotiators for the 16 countries, which also include India and the 10 states of the Association of Southeast Asia Nations met in Busan, South Korea, last month to discuss market opening and tariff reductions on goods and services.

But progress has been slow for the pact first proposed four years ago even as the US-backed Trans-Pacific Partnership  trade pact that includes Japan was struck earlier in October.

South Korean and Chinese ties with Japan have been troubled by what they see as repeated failures by leaders in Tokyo to properly atone for wartime atrocities, in particular for Seoul over "comfort women", as the mostly Korean women forced into prostitution at Japanese military brothels are called.

The meeting is a diplomatic breakthrough for Abe, who had long sought a one-on-one meeting with Park and the resumption of the trilateral summit. The two will hold a bilateral meeting on Monday, the first since both took office.

On Sunday he credited Park for restoring the forum.

"It is a breakthrough for the region and the three countries that we hold this trilateral summit for the first time in three and a half years through the initiative of President Park," he told the news conference.

"Japan, China and South Korea are neighbours, and because we are neighbours, there are difficult issues among us."

Li said Japan had yet to do all it can to appease the suspicion held by the two countries that suffered under its wartime aggression about Tokyo's view on promoting genuine regional cooperation.

"Cooperation should be made on the basis of handling sensitive issues such as history in a proper way and by promoting mutual understanding in Northeast Asia," Li said at the opening of the three-way summit.

"It is regrettable that even among our three very close countries, there cannot be a deeper understanding among us."

Nuclear North

Sunday's meeting highlighted a balancing act Park faced between her country's rapidly developing ties with Beijing and US pressure to mend relations with Tokyo, Washington's key Asian ally in the face of an increasingly assertive China.

It also afforded Park an opportunity to be seen addressing issues of regional interest that included tackling North Korea's arms programme.

The leaders in a joint statement reaffirmed "firm opposition to the development of nuclear weapons on the Korean peninsula", referring to North Korea's pursuit of atomic weapons in the face of international sanctions and condemnation.

There was no mention by the leaders of tensions in the South China Sea where a US destroyer sailed close to one of Beijing's man-made islands in the most significant US challenge yet to territorial claims by China in the Spratly archipelago.