AKIPRESS.COM - U.S. President Barack Obama is seeking to reassure Japanese leaders that he can deliver on his security and economic pledges to Asia even as the crisis in Ukraine demands U.S. attention and resources elsewhere, ABC News reported.

The standoff between Ukraine and Russia is threatening to overshadow Obama's four-country Asia swing that began Wednesday. He may decide during the trip whether to levy new economic sanctions on Moscow, a step that would signal the failure of an international agreement aimed at defusing the crisis.

But at least publicly Obama will try to keep the focus on his Asia agenda, which includes reaffirming his commitment to a defense treaty with Japan, making progress on a stalled trans-Pacific trade agreement and finalizing a deal to modestly increase the American military footprint in the Philippines.

Obama steered clear of more sensitive topics like the trade and China tensions as he and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe sat down for a morning meeting at Tokyo's Akasaka Palace. Instead, Obama spoke of a U.S.-Japanese bond that transcends its military alliance.

Abe said he and Obama would be discussing the future of the “indispensable and irreplaceable” alliance.

Obama opened the first state visit by an American president to Japan in nearly 20 years on Wednesday night, when he and Abe had dinner at Tokyo's sushi restaurant.

Obama's stops in Japan, South Korea, Malaysia and the Philippines serve as something of a do-over after he canceled a visit to Asia last fall because of the U.S. government shutdown. The cancellation provided fresh fodder for those in the region who worry that the White House's much-hyped pivot to Asia is continually taking a backseat to other foreign and domestic priorities.

The U.S. President faces a particularly tricky balance in Tokyo, which is locked in a tense territorial dispute with China over islands Japan oversees in the East China Sea. The U.S. has a defense treaty requiring it to come to Japan's defense if it is attacked, and Obama is expected to reaffirm his commitment to that agreement.