Security environment in Asia Pacific becoming more difficult: says Japanese PM

In an oblique reference to the recent Chinese stridsency over Japan's Senkaku islands claimed by China and the nuclear tests conducted by the North Korea, Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe told US president Barack Obama in Washington that the security environment in the Asia-Pacific region was becoming "more and more difficult".

"When we look at the security environment in the Asia Pacific, it's becoming more and more difficult. And we need to create an order in this region based on cooperation between our two countries to secure the freedom of the seas and to secure a region which is governed based on laws, not on force," Abe told reporters in the Oval Office at a joint press availability with Obama after the meeting between the two.

This was first time Obama was meeting a foreign leader in the Oval Office of White House in his second term, which began since 20 January.

"We just cannot tolerate the actions of North Korea, such as launching missiles and conducting nuclear tests. So we agreed that we would cooperate with each other in dealing resolutely with North Korea," Obama said.

Obama and Abe held wide range of talks on bilateral and regional issues. Obama said he expressed his appreciation for the support Japan had provided to US efforts in Afghanistan, and its efforts to resolve the nuclear issue in Iran and expressed mutual condolences around the loss of life at the BP plant in Algeria and pledged that this would spur greater counter-terrorism cooperation.

The Japanese leader insisted that history and international law proved that the islands, known as the Senkaku in Japanese and the Diaoyu in Chinese, were Japan's sovereign territory.