The Abe administration's security bills to lift the ban on Japan engaging in acts of collective self-defense and significantly expand the scope of Self-Defense Forces' overseas missions would also amend the 1992 law on Japan's participation in United Nations-led peacekeeping operations.
The revision, to which little attention has been paid in Diet deliberations, would pave the way for SDF units deployed in peacekeeping missions to use weapons for the protection of civilians and other nations' troops — in addition to self-defense as allowed under the current law — and also allow the SDF to join peace cooperation activities carried out by international organizations other than the U.N. or by groups of nations.
The amendment would have an immediate impact on the safety of SDF personnel currently deployed on a mission in South Sudan. The U.N. nowadays gives top priority to protection of civilians — local residents in most cases — in which exchanges of fire with armed elements would be inevitable for peacekeepers if civilians are being attacked.