Dick Cheney, the US Vice-President, landed in Tokyo last night for what promised to be a frosty series of meetings, after weeks of outspoken criticism of American policy from within the Japanese Government.

Japanese Cabinet Ministers have openly denounced US policy in Iraq as childish and accused the Bush Administration of being cocky. The latest blow was last week’s agreement on North Korea’s nuclear programme which is privately regarded by many in Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s Government as an American betrayal. Yasuhisa Shiozaki, Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary, could hardly have been more dismissive of Mr Cheney’s visit. “Since the other party is coming over,” he said yesterday, when asked what was the point of Mr Cheney’s visit, “it must have some point for the other party.”

The surge of bad feeling towards Japan’s greatest friend and ally is symptomatic of the unease which has spread since Junichiro Koizumi stepped down last September after five years as the country’s most dynamic postwar Prime Minister. After an impressive first month, in which he began to mend strained relations with China and South Korea, Mr Abe’s popularity has gone into a slump, and he has appeared increasingly incapable of controlling his Cabinet.

Last month his Fumio Kyu-ma, his Defence Minister, became the first Japanese Cabinet Minister openly to question the Bush Administration’s decision to invade Iraq, saying that it was a mistake based on faulty assumption that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction.

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