The trade ministers of South Korea, Japan and China held an annual trilateral meeting in Tokyo on Saturday during which they agreed to jointly deal with protectionism amid the global economic downturn, Yonhap News Agency reported on Saturday.

    South Korea's Trade Minister Joo Hyung-hwan and his Japanese and Chinese counterparts -- Hiroshige Seko and Gao Hucheng -- also expressed worries about a rise in protectionism, the South Korean ministry said in a statement.

    The ministers agreed to accelerate the talks aimed at forging a three-way free trade deal among the nations, according to the statement. Since launching the talks in late 2012, South Korea, Japan and China have made little headway toward a deal that, if successful, would create one of the world's biggest economic blocs with a combined gross domestic product of US$15 trillion.

Source: QNA