Japan to sign nuclear treaty with UAE: PM

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said his country will sign a nuclear treaty with the UAE today as he stressed Tokyo's cooperation with its Middle East partners.
Abe, making his second visit to the Gulf country as prime minister, arrived late yesterday in the United Arab Emirates, Japan's eighth largest world economic partner, to take part in a Japan-UAE Business Forum.
At the forum, he said his country will sign a nuclear treaty with the UAE, without elaborating.
"This time, Japan and the UAE will sign a nuclear treaty," he said, according to a translation from Japanese. "Japan can contribute to UAE energy supplies by means of nuclear energy conservation and renewable energy."

Sources close to Abe said the treaty will be signed in Dubai during Abe's meeting with its ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum.
For his part, UAE Energy Minister Suhail al-Mazrouei, called for stable world oil prices at the forum.

"We seek as an energy-producing country stability in world prices, to enable exporting and consuming countries to steadily develop and build their economies," he said.
Nearly a third of the UAE production of crude oil and petrol derivatives go to Japan while the oil-rich country's liquefied natural gas production has been used to generate electricity in Tokyo since 1977, according to Mazrouei.

Meanwhile, Abe said Japan aims "to closely cooperate and coordinate with countries in the region," adding that "stability and prosperity of the Middle East is directly connected to the prosperity of international society and Japan.