Southeast Asian and Japanese leaders are to agree to boost “maritime security cooperation,” according to a draft statement from a summit that started yesterday against the backdrop of growing tensions in the South China Sea.
China claims almost the entire waterway, a vital trade corridor, and its increasingly aggressive behavior in disputed areas has riled nations across the region as well as Washington.
Close US ally Japan, which also has competing territorial claims with China, is upping its military spending and has already boosted security cooperation in the Asia-Pacific region, including with South Korea and Australia.
Photo: AFP
According to the draft of the weekend summit’s final statement, Japan and ASEAN are to commit to strengthening “security cooperation, including maritime security cooperation.”
Japan on Wednesday expressed “serious concern” about “dangerous actions” after the latest tense confrontation between Philippine and Chinese vessels at flashpoint reefs that included a collision and Chinese ships shooting water cannons.
Tokyo added that it “concurs with the Philippines’ long-standing objections to unlawful maritime claims, militarization, coercive activities, and threat or use of force in the South China Sea.”
Japan last month agreed to help the Philippines buy coast guard vessels and to supply a radar system, and the two are discussing allowing troop deployments on each other’s soil.
With Kuala Lumpur, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida yesterday said that he had agreed with Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim to deepen strategic ties and provide ￥400 million (US$2.81 million) for “warning and surveillance” equipment.
Kishida said that with the world “at a historical turning point, Japan places great importance on promoting cooperation with ASEAN, including Malaysia, to maintain and strengthen a free and open international order based on the rule of law and to ensure a world where human dignity is protected.”
Malaysia, along with Taiwan, the Philippines, Vietnam and Brunei, also have overlapping claims in the South China Sea.
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