Asia tensions simmer ahead of Obama tour

US President Barack Obama arrives in a tense Asian region on Wednesday, faced with the delicate task of assuring Japan and other regional allies of America’s commitment to their defense without hurting Washington’s vital ties with a rising China. That difficult diplomatic balancing act was highlighted on Monday, when Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe sent a ritual offering to Tokyo’s Yasukuni Shrine, seen in parts of the region as a symbol of Japan’s past militarism. The move strained Tokyo’s already tense ties with China and fellow US ally South Korea, another stop on his four-nation tour that will also take in Malaysia and the Philippines. Japan, for its part, has been beset by anxiety over the degree to which reality matches rhetoric in Obama’s promised “pivot” of US military and diplomatic assets to Asia. Abe and Obama will be keen to send a message that the alliance – central to America’s presence in Asia and the core of Tokyo’s security policy – is stronger than ever when they hold their symbolic summit on Thursday. The two leaders are also likely to discuss how to deal with North Korea at a time when the region is jittery over a possible nuclear test by an unpredictable Pyongyang. North Korea, already subject to United Nations’ sanctions over its previous atomic tests, the third and most recent of which took place in early 2013, threatened last month to conduct what it call “a new form of nuclear test”. On Monday the North’s KCNA news agency quoted a foreign ministry spokesman saying Obama’s trip was a “reactionary and dangerous one as it is aimed to escalate confrontation and bring dark clouds of a nuclear arms race to hang over this unstable region”, according to Reuters.