The defense chiefs of Japan, the United States and South Korea on Sunday signed a memorandum institutionalizing their trilateral defense ties to sustain policy consultations, information-sharing and joint exercises, amid North Korea's nuclear and missile threats and China's growing assertiveness in the region.
"By signing this memorandum, our trilateral cooperation...has become more solidified and will not waver, even under changes in international circumstances," Japanese Defense Minister Minoru Kihara told reporters following his meeting with U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and South Korean Defense Minister Shin Won Sik in Tokyo.
The agreements in the memorandum on the Trilateral Security Cooperation Framework, which has already come into effect, include those on taking turns hosting ministerial meetings every year and closely sharing real-time information about North Korean missiles, according to Kihara.
The next trilateral ministerial meeting will be convened in South Korea next year.
The three countries have been fleshing out what they call a "new era" of trilateral partnership since their leaders met at the U.S. presidential retreat of Camp David near Washington in August last year, leveraging the benefits of the rapprochement between Tokyo and Seoul.
The latest development also came as closer alignment between Russia and China, as well as with North Korea, has been seen amid Russia's war on Ukraine, while the U.S. presidential election in November is closely watched as to whether Donald Trump, a critic of long-standing alliances, will return to the White House.
In a joint press statement issued on Sunday, the three ministers expressed "grave concern over the increasing military and economic cooperation commitment" between Pyongyang and Moscow.
They also vowed to deter nuclear and missile threats posed by North Korea, and condemned Pyongyang's tests and launches of multiple ballistic missiles and other relevant activities, urging the country to "immediately cease" provocative actions that could escalate tensions on the Korean Peninsula.
Apparently with China's forceful stance in the East and South China seas in mind, they also reaffirmed that they "strongly oppose any unilateral attempts to change the status quo in the waters of the Indo-Pacific."
Tokyo, Washington and Seoul have been concerned about China's maritime claims in the South China Sea, where tensions have risen amid confrontations between Chinese and Philippine vessels. Chinese vessels have also repeatedly intruded into Japanese territorial waters around the Tokyo-controlled, Beijing-claimed uninhabited Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea.
At the outset of the talks, Austin said the meeting was meant to come up with "a powerful message" on the commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific. Shin, who became the first South Korean defense minister since 2009 to visit Japan, said beefing up cooperation among the three countries is essential in countering North Korean threats.
When they held the previous meeting in June in Singapore on the sidelines of a regional security conference, Kihara, Austin and Shin had agreed to institutionalize trilateral security cooperation.
Later in the month, the three countries conducted a new annual joint military exercise dubbed "Freedom Edge," spanning aerial, naval and cyber domains in areas including the East China Sea.
The three governments have also fully activated a real-time information-sharing system for missiles launched by Pyongyang in December last year.
Earlier on Sunday, Kihara and Shin affirmed during their bilateral talks their commitment to boost exchanges between their defense officials and officers, including mutual visits by ministers, saying they will craft an annual plan on the issue.
The plan will also include resuming mutual visits at the level of top uniformed officers, according to the Japanese Defense Ministry.
Tokyo-Seoul relations have been strained over wartime historical issues and other issues such as an alleged locking of a fire-control radar on a Japanese patrol plane by a South Korean warship in 2018, which South Korea still denies.
But the ties have been recovering after conservative Yoon Suk Yeol replaced left-leaning Moon Jae In as the South Korean president in May 2022, especially since a solution to a bilateral wartime labor dispute was announced in March last year.
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