Japan yesterday adopted a new five-year ocean policy that calls for stronger maritime security, including bolstering its coast guard’s capability and cooperation with the military amid China’s increasing assertiveness in regional seas.
The new Basic Plan on Ocean Policy, adopted by Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s Cabinet, also says that Japan must accelerate the development of autonomous underwater vehicles and remotely operated robots to bolster its surveillance capability.
It cited a list of threats: The Chinese Coast Guard’s repeated intrusions into Japanese territorial waters, growing unauthorized maritime activity by “foreign survey boats” inside Japan’s exclusive economic zone, increasing joint military exercises by China and Russia, and North Korea’s repeated missile launches.
Photo: AP
“The situation in the ocean around Japan is increasingly tense,” Kishida said at a policy meeting yesterday. “It’s time for us to unite our wisdom among the industry, academia and government for ocean policy reform.”
He also noted the need to better use maritime resources to achieve carbon neutrality.
The new ocean policy is in line with Japan’s new national security strategy, which Kishida’s government adopted in December last year in a major break from its self-defense-only principle that the country has maintained under a pacifist constitution since World War II.
The new strategy highlights bolstering Japan’s military power with strike capability and doubling its defense budget within five years. The strategy also calls for closer cooperation between the military and the coast guard in any emergency over Taiwan or other possible conflicts.
The plan also said the capability of Japan’s coast guard, which has been on the front line of border disputes, needs to be improved. It frequently confronts Chinese Coast Guard vessels approaching disputed Japanese-controlled islands in the East China Sea, North Korean poachers and suspected spy boats, and Russian Coast Guard vessels near disputed northern islands.
The Japanese Coast Guard is used for civilian policing at sea and not military combat, and the new plans calling for closer cooperation with the Japanese Self-Defense Forces have raised concerns about its role and safety in a possible conflict.
The ocean plan also says Japan needs to be more aggressive about undersea surveys and using undersea resources for energy, calling for greater use of the exclusive economic zone outside of territorial waters to build offshore wind-power generators.
Japan has repeatedly protested over Chinese research ships entering its waters or the exclusive economic zone close to its boundary for apparent surveys of undersea deposits and other marine resources.
Tropical Storm Usagi strengthened to a typhoon yesterday morning and remains on track to brush past southeastern Taiwan from tomorrow to Sunday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was approximately 950km east-southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan proper’s southernmost point, the CWA said. It is expected to enter the Bashi Channel and then turn north, moving into waters southeast of Taiwan, it said. The agency said it could issue a sea warning in the early hours of today and a land warning in the afternoon. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was moving at
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The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday said there are four weather systems in the western Pacific, with one likely to strengthen into a tropical storm and pose a threat to Taiwan. The nascent tropical storm would be named Usagi and would be the fourth storm in the western Pacific at the moment, along with Typhoon Yinxing and tropical storms Toraji and Manyi, the CWA said. It would be the first time that four tropical cyclones exist simultaneously in November, it added. Records from the meteorology agency showed that three tropical cyclones existed concurrently in January in 1968, 1991 and 1992.
UPDATED FORECAST: The warning covered areas of Pingtung County and Hengchun Peninsula, while a sea warning covering the southern Taiwan Strait was amended The Central Weather Administration (CWA) at 5:30pm yesterday issued a land warning for Typhoon Usagi as the storm approached Taiwan from the south after passing over the Philippines. As of 5pm, Usagi was 420km south-southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan proper’s southernmost tip, with an average radius of 150km, the CWA said. The land warning covered areas of Pingtung County and the Hengchun Peninsula (恆春), and came with an amended sea warning, updating a warning issued yesterday morning to cover the southern part of the Taiwan Strait. No local governments had announced any class or office closures as of press time last night. The typhoon
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