TOKYO - China is absent at an international conference that kicked off?in Tokyo?Tuesday for Asian and Pacific countries to discuss disaster relief operations, said officials of the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force.

The conference, organized by the GSDF and called the Multinational Cooperation Program in the Asia-Pacific, has been held annually since 2002. China has taken part in the gathering in 2010 and 2011.

China's non-participation comes at a time when relations between the two neighbors have sunk to their lowest point in years in the wake of Japanese government's "purchase" earlier this month of parts of the Diaoyu Islands in the East China Sea.

The conference, which has attracted 23 countries this year, will run through September 29.