U.S. Urges Japan to Beef Up Defense Capabilities

   Washington, July 1 (Jiji Press)--U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio underscored the importance of Japan beefing up its defense capabilities at a meeting with his Japanese counterpart, Takeshi Iwaya, in Washington on Tuesday.
   Iwaya replied that Japan "will carry out a drastic defense buildup on its own judgement," he told reporters after the meeting.
   According to the Japanese foreign minister, he and Rubio did not discuss a specific level of Japan's defense spending or its host-nation financial support for U.S. Forces Japan.
   Meanwhile, they reaffirmed their close cooperation for reinforcing the deterrence and response capabilities of the Japan-U.S. alliance and agreed to move ahead with preparatory work for a bilateral "two-plus-two" meeting of foreign and defense ministers.
   In view of moves by China and North Korea, Iwaya and Rubio supported the idea of Tokyo and Washington keeping making concrete efforts to achieve a free and open Indo-Pacific while strengthening cooperative ties under multilateral frameworks with like-minded countries and other U.S. allies in the region, such as Australia, India, the Philippines and South Korea.

(2025/07/02-12:49)