TOKYO, April 10 (UPI) -- Vice President Dick Cheney arrived Saturday in Japan for talks with Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi that are expected to focus on Iraq and North Korea.
On the top of the agenda will be the three Japanese nationals kidnapped in Iraq by a militant group that has threatened to kill them if Japan refuses to pull its Self-Defense Forces from that nation by Sunday night. The Japanese troops are assigned to reconstruction aid assistance in Samawah, Iraq.
The Kyodo News Service reported Koizumi and Cheney are also expected to call for complete, verifiable and irreversible dismantlement of all North Korean nuclear programs and to reaffirm the need to launch a six-nation working group.
Cheney is also expected to meet with other senior Japanese officials, including Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda and Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi.
The Republican vice president will meet with Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko Tuesday and deliver a speech to mark the 150th anniversary of the U.S.-Japan Treaty of Peace and Amity.
After Japan, Cheny's three-nation Asian tour is scheduled to take him to China and South Korea.
