Remarks Following Discussions With Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan in Heiligendamm,
June 6, 2007

President Bush. It’s good to be with a friend, Shinzo Abe. We recently met at Camp David, and now we have a—we were on the phone since then, and now we have a chance to further our discussions.

We talked about a lot of subjects. Particularly, we talked about North Korea. There is a common message here, and that is, weexpect the North Koreans to honor agreements. And it’s very important for the Japanese people to know that I strongly support Shinzo Abe’s desire to deal with this very important issue of—the abduction issue.

Likewise, we had an extensive discussion about energy and climate change. I reminded the Prime Minister that his great country and great economy is going to lead the way when it comes—along with the United States, in leading the way coming to develop technologies that will enable us to be—change our energy habits and, at the same time, be good stewards of the environment. And we discussed ways to develop a framework that has the flexibility and, at the same time, the goals so we can encourage the world to move in that direction.

It’s good to be with a friend.

Prime Minister Abe. This is the sixth time that I’m having discussions with George, and as we always do, this time we were able to have a very frank exchange of views on many things. On North Korea, unfortunately, the North Koreans have not done anything to implement the initial actions. And also on the issue of abduction, they have not taken any sincere actions to resolve that issue. So we agreed that the G-8 leaders need to send a strong message to North Korea on these issues. And also on the abduction issue, I explained the Japanese position to George once again, and I was able to gain his understanding on this issue, as he has always shown understanding.

On climate change, I explained the Japanese proposal to the President, and we agreed that Japan and the United States would be working together for the creation of an effective framework which is flexible, and that we would be cooperating to achieve that end in the future.

We reconfirmed the fact that the alliance we have between Japan and the United States in dealing with issues like North Korea and climate change is truly an alliance for Asia and an alliance for the entire world, for that matter.

President Bush. Thank you, sir. Thank you all very much.

Note: The President spoke at 3:29 p.m. at the Kempinski Grand Hotel Heiligendamm. Prime Minister Abe spoke in Japanese, and his remarks were translated by an interpreter. A tape was not available for verification of the content of these remarks.