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WASHINGTON, Jan. 13 (PTI) — U.S. President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida are due to meet at the White House on Friday in what administration officials say will take the bilateral alliance to a whole new level.
The meeting, held a day after the two countries announced plans to expand their security alliance into space, comes against a backdrop of threats to regional and global security architecture posed by Chinese aggression that has forced Tokyo to sharply increase defense spending.
“From our perspective, the message is absolutely clear. Japan is stepping up and in lockstep with the United States. Our investment in the alliance is paying off tremendously, and we look forward to celebrating that tomorrow,” strategic coordinator John · Kirby (John Kirby) said. White House National Security Council correspondents told reporters at a news conference here on Thursday.
Kishida arrived in Washington after a series of extensive discussions with European partners from Italy to Britain, France and Canada. Kirby hopes the two leaders will also have the opportunity to report back on those discussions.
“We are modernizing the alliance by announcing that attacks from and within space could lead to the invocation of Article 5 of the U.S.-Japan security treaty. Expanding our bilateral training exercises to include Japan’s southwestern islands,” Kirby said.
“Of course, deepening cooperation in the region, including trilateral training and exercises with Australia, and strengthening cooperation with South Korea on ballistic missile defense, anti-submarine warfare and maritime security,” he told reporters at a White House news conference.
“All of these initiatives will not only strengthen our joint ability to defend Japan, but will also bring the United States and Japan together to maintain peace and security in the Indo-Pacific region and strengthen deterrence in the region and globally,” he said.
“I do think that President Biden will also have an opportunity tomorrow to discuss with Prime Minister Kishida the progress we will make together on a range of national security and economic issues over the next year. Japan holds a G-7 presidency,” he said.
Japan just won a seat on the UN Security Council. “While we will host APEC this year and seek to make rapid progress on the Indo-Pacific economic framework, there is a lot of overlap there and we look forward to it. We will discuss how we will align those agendas in the future,” Ko Than say.
Last month, Kishida released Japan’s new national security strategy and pledged to boost Japan’s defense spending to 2 percent of its GDP, including investment in new defense capabilities. “This is a historic commitment from Japan,” he said.
(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from a Syndicated News feed, the content body may not have been modified or edited by LatestLY staff)
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