TOKYO -- Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said Wednesday he will try to arrange a meeting with U.S. President Joe Biden soon, possibly by year-end, following up a chat on the sidelines of the United Nations climate conference.

Kishida returned to Japan on Sunday from the COP26 summit in Glasgow, where he met separately with the prime ministers of the U.K., Australia and Vietnam. He decided to go on the unusually short trip despite a tight political schedule for the opportunity to meet with world leaders.

For Kishida, the top priority is a summit with Biden. The U.S. president was the first leader he spoke with over the phone, a day after taking office on Oct. 5.

"We agreed to set up a meeting for a more lengthy talk," Kishida told reporters, describing his chat with the president. "We will do it as soon as possible, including within the year."

Kishida's schedule for the remainder of the year includes hammering out economic measures, Diet deliberations and the drafting of the fiscal 2022 budget in late December. Biden also has a lot of domestic issues on this plate, so coordinating a meeting this year may prove difficult. Many observers believe the get-together will have to wait until next year.

Kishida is eager to meet with Biden soon because the stability of the government in Tokyo often depends on a Japanese prime minister's relations with the U.S. president. Former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's building of a personal rapport with then- U.S. President Donald Trump was key to achieving a soft landing over the bilateral trade issues that Trump pushed Japan to address.

Slumping approval ratings at home have prompted Biden to turn his attention to domestic issues ahead of next year's midterm elections. For foreign affairs, he will likely focused on relations with countries that voters are interested in.

It was French President Emmanuel Macron who hosted a meeting with Biden on Oct. 29 at the Group of 20 summit in Rome, seeking to show strong bilateral ties after their relations soured over an agreement to provide Australia with nuclear-propelled submarine tech under the AUKUS alliance between the U.S., U.K. and Australia.

U.S.-Japan relations are relatively stable now, so Biden may not feel a need to meet with Kishida soon. At the COP26 summit, he took time to hold meetings with the leaders of Indonesia and Estonia, which have started to distance themselves from China.