South Korea and Japan agreed that the two sides should not neglect their frayed ties any longer.

First Vice Foreign Minister Cho Sei-young told reporters that South Korean Prime Minister Lee Nak-yon and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe reached the agreement during their meeting in Tokyo on Thursday.

Cho said the two sides also agreed on the importance of bilateral as well as trilateral cooperation with the U.S. 

Lee and Abe met for about 20 minutes at the latter's office in Tokyo. 

The meeting marked the highest-level talks between the two sides since their ties soured over a South Korean Supreme Court decision last year, which ordered defendant Japanese companies to pay reparations to Korean victims of their wartime forced labor.