Japan and NATO have ushered in a new era in bilateral relations with the completion of a deal that will see Tokyo step up cooperation with the world’s most powerful military alliance in several additional areas, amid shared concerns over Russia and China.
Collaboration will go beyond traditional security areas and extend to cyber, emerging and disruptive technologies and strategic communications, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said Wednesday at a NATO leaders’ summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, about Japan’s recently agreed to deal with the trans-Atlantic alliance, called the Individually Tailored Partnership Program (ITPP).
In short remarks made alongside NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, Kishida said the new deal comes not only in response to an increasingly severe international security environment but also in recognition that the security of Europe and the Indo-Pacific are “inseparable.”