Japan–Mexico relations

This agreement was Japan's first "equal" treaty with any country;[1] which overshadows Tokugawa Ieyasu's pre-Edo period initiatives which sought to establish official relations with New Spain in Mexico.

[2] Under Spanish colonial rule, Mexico, then known as New Spain, controlled the trade routes between Manila, capital of the Philippines and the Mexican port of Acapulco.

In March 1611, the Spanish viceroy Veleazco sent a mission directly from Acapulco to Japan thanking the Japanese government for assisting his governor de Vivero and reimbursed them for the ship San Buenaventura, and giving them gifts in homage, one of them being a clock made in Madrid and it was to be the first clock that people of Japan had ever seen before.

The diplomatic mission also offered to expel both English and Dutch citizens from the country because both nations were considered at the time to be enemies of the Spanish king.

Upon arrival to Mexico City, Hasekura was surprised to see that most members of his delegation that he had left behind, had married and integrated into the Mexican community.

Since Hasekura's diplomatic mission to New Spain, Japan entered a time of isolation and refused to trade with foreign nations.

The expedition from Mexico to Japan in 1874, led by the Mexican scientist Francisco Díaz Covarrubias, was the reason why formal attempts were made between representatives of the governments of both countries to have diplomatic relations.

In 1874 (53 years after Mexico declared independence from Spain in 1821), a Mexican scientific delegation headed by Francisco Díaz Covarrubias arrived in Japan to witness the transit of the planet Venus through a solar disc.

[3][6] The fact that Mexico agreed to sign a more just treaty in comparison to the treaties reached by other countries that favored the Europeans over the Japanese was seen as a grateful act for the Asian nation; and so the Mexican embassy in Tokyo was given a unique location right next to the Official Residence of the Prime Minister in the heart of the Japanese capital, in an area reserved for the room of senior rulers of the country.

In 1941, Mexico closed its diplomatic legation in Tokyo and consulate in Yokohama as a result of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

In 1952, Mexico becomes the second country to ratify the San Francisco Peace Treaty (preceded only by the United Kingdom), officially ending the state of war.

[12] High-level visits from Japan to Mexico[1] High-level visits from Mexico to Japan[1] Both nations are members of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, CPTPP, Forum of East Asia–Latin America Cooperation, G20 major economies, International Monetary Fund, OECD, United Nations and the World Trade Organization, among others.

Interestingly, Mifune gave a Japanese pistol to then-Mexican president Adolfo López Mateos when they met in Oaxaca.

[14] Japanese cultural imports such as anime, video games, food, films, music (J-pop) have had a significant impact in Mexico.

Mexico's main exports to Japan include: electrical equipment, telephones and mobile phones, copper ore and other minerals, silver, parts and accessories for motor vehicles, steel, iron chemical based products, meat, fruits and alcohol.

Mexican multinational companies such as Grupo Altex, KidZania, Orbia, Proeza, San Luis Rassini and Sukarne (among others) operate in Japan.

San Juan Bautista ship docked in Acapulco bay in 1614
Birthplace Monument of Traffic and Friendship between Japan, Spain and Mexico in Onjuku , Japan
Monument to Hasekura Tsunenaga in the Plaza Japón of Acapulco , Mexico. The sculpture is a replica of a monument on the Aoba Castle grounds in Sendai , Japan.
The Tribuna Monument to Squadron 201, which fought in the Philippines campaign against Imperial Japan
President Enrique Peña Nieto and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at a press conference during an official visit to Japan by President Peña Nieto in April 2013.
A Mexican dollar used as currency in Japan, marked with "Aratame sanbu sadame" (改三分定, fixed to the value of 3 bu ).