JAPAN, CHINA OFFICIALS MET OVER ISLAND DISPUTE
TOKYO: Japan and China held high-level talks at the weekend as they seek ways to repair relations damaged by a territorial row over islands in the East China Sea, Tokyo said on Wednesday.

Relations between the two countries have sunk to new lows in a vicious spat over a group of uninhibited, Tokyo-administered islands, called the Senkakus in Japan and the Diaoyus in China. Japanese Vice Foreign Minister Chikao Kawai visited Shanghai over the weekend and met China’s Vice Foreign Minister Zhang Zhijun to discuss the island dispute. But Japan’s spokesman Osamu Fujimura declined to confirm further details, including who took part.

ASEAN CHIEF REJECTS REFUGEE BOAT POLICY
SYDNEY: Association of Southeast Asian Nations Secretary General Surin Pitsuwan labeled as “counterproductive” the controversial policy of the Australian opposition party to turn back asylum-seeker boats, the Sydney Morning Herald reported on Wednesday. As part of his plan to tackle the growing problem, opposition leader Tony Abbott has said that he will instruct the navy to tow back the boats, which mostly travel from Indonesia, if he wins power in elections due next year. But Pitsuwan said that he believed much of what Abbott said was rhetoric for a domestic audience but warned Australia’s ties to the region could be hurt if he followed through with his threat.

BBC CHIEF DEFENDS HANDLING OF SEX SCANDAL
LONDON: The head of the BBC defended the broadcaster’s response to allegations of sex abuse by late TV star Jimmy Savile before British lawmakers, but admitted its reputation had taken a hit.

Director General George Entwistle said that the world’s biggest public broad-caster regretted dropping a television probe into allegations of widespread abuse of underage girls by Savile. But Entwistle denied that pressure from BBC top brass had forced flagship current affairs television show “Newsnight” to shelve its investigation late last year. Savile, a DJ who rose to become one of the biggest and most distinctive perso-nalities of BBC television from the 1960s until the 1980s, died in October at the age of 84.