Emperor Naruhito of Japan received Czech President Petr Pavel at the Imperial Palace in Tokyo this morning. President Pavel then met Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba as the culmination of his visit to Japan.
The Emperor received Pavel at 11 am local time (4 am CEST) and the meeting lasted about half an hour.
Pavel described the meeting as very friendly, and said the topic of the meeting with the emperor was not the domestic or foreign political situation. He told Czech journalists they had discussed the World Expo and how the Czech Republic was helping Ukraine.
“We mainly touched upon the quality of cooperation between the Czech Republic and Japan in areas that are more general, that is, people-to-people relations, culture, sports, points of contact, which are certainly not few. But we also talked about how the Czech Republic is helping Ukraine, for example, because this is something that the Japanese generally appreciate very much,” he said.
According to Pavel, the emperor also mentioned his time in the Czech Republic during his unofficial five-day visit in 1985. “He also recalled playing the violin with our quartet because classical music is one of his favourite domains,” the president noted.
Subsequently, Pavel met PM Ishiba, and both of them praised the long-standing friendly relations between the Czech Republic and Japan at the beginning of the meeting. Ishiba also mentioned that he enjoys listening to Czech music, specifically the compositions of Antonin Dvorak.
The President and the Prime Minister discussed Japanese investment in the Czech Republic and the potential for further development of cooperation in the fields of defence, aviation and information technology. They also touched on broader security issues, including the approach to China, Russia and North Korea. In the end, they agreed on their common interest in further deepening cooperation, the president’s spokesperson Filip Platos told reporters.
In his introduction, Pavel highlighted Japan’s role in the economic transformation after 1989 and its cooperation within NATO and support for Ukraine. The Czech President also said he appreciated that Ishiba had found time for the meeting at a time when he was dealing with a challenging domestic political situation.
The Japanese prime minister is facing pressure from the public and members of his party to resign after Sunday’s elections to the upper house of parliament, where his ruling coalition lost its majority. The government also lacks a majority in the lower house of parliament. Reuters reported on Wednesday, citing Japanese media, that Ishiba would announce his resignation by the end of next month. However, the prime minister denied the speculation a few hours later.
The Czech president arrived in Japan on Tuesday. He visited the cities of Himeji and Hiroshima, and attended the Czech National Day at the World Expo exhibition in Osaka, which runs from April to October this year.
Naruhito became Japan’s emperor in May 2019, following the abdication of his father Akihito for health reasons. This also marked the end of the Heisei period, or “pervasive peace”, in Japan, and the beginning of the Reiwa era, whose name translates as “beautiful harmony”. Naruhito is the 126th emperor from the world’s oldest ruling dynasty, and the first Japanese monarch born after the end of World War II.
As a member of the Japanese imperial family, he traveled the world extensively in his youth. In 1985, he made an unofficial five-day visit to Prague, Cesky Krumlov, and other historic cities. He is said to be a connoisseur and admirer of Czech music.
Among Czech presidents, Vaclav Klaus visited Japan in 2007 and 2008. In 2007, he and his wife Livia were received by Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko. President Vaclav Havel paid a four-day visit to Japan in December 1995.
