Japan, US defence chiefs to hold talks in Guam, with eye on China and North Korea

Mark Esper and Taro Kono will meet in Guam on August 29, amid China’s increasing maritime assertiveness in the East and South China seas
The two are also likely to discuss Japan’s deterrence against North Korean missile threats

Japan

KyodoandAssociated Press

Published: 12:12pm, 20 Aug 2020

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Japan’s Defence Minister Taro Kono is arranging talks with his US counterpart Mark Esper on August 29 when he visits the US territory of Guam, ministry sources said, with China and North Korea expected to be high on their agenda.

It would be the Japanese minister’s first overseas trip since he refrained from travelling due to the coronavirus pandemic, having last attended an international conference in Germany in February.

Esper is next week travelling to Palau, Hawaii and Guam, the Pentagon said on Wednesday.

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Kono plans to travel to Guam on a Self-Defence Forces aircraft and hold talks with Esper at a US base there, according to the sources.

The two are expected to discuss how to respond to China’s increasing maritime assertiveness in the East and South China seas, where Beijing has been stepping up territorial claims, the sources said.

They are also likely to discuss Japan’s deterrence against North Korea’s missile threats, following Tokyo’s decision in June to scrap plans to deploy the US-developed Aegis Ashore missile defence system.

Kono and Esper held a videoconference in early July with Linda Reynolds, their counterpart in Australia, where they reaffirmed their “strong opposition” to the use of force or coercion that could alter the status quo and increase tensions in the East and South China seas, apparently with China in mind.

Japanese Defence Minister Taro Kono. Photo: AP

Esper has made the Asia-Pacific region his top policy priority, although Palau is a rare destination for an American defence secretary.

Palau, an archipelago situated southeast of the Philippines, was administered by the US for half a century before gaining independence in 1994. It is now among the Freely Associated states of the Pacific, along with Micronesia and the Marshall Islands, which are sovereign nations but have compacts with the US that govern economic and other relations.

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Guam was the scene of a lengthy and drama-filled US Navy battle against the coronavirus; the aircraft carrier USS Theodore Roosevelt pulled into Guam last spring after suffering a virus outbreak that killed one sailor.

During his trip, Esper will attend commemorative events marking the 75th anniversary of the end of World War II.

The battleship USS Missouri, aboard which Allied and Japanese representatives signed the war’s surrender documents on September 2, 1945, is now a memorial standing in Hawaii’s Pearl Harbour.

This article appeared in the South China Morning Post print edition as: US, Japan defence chiefs for Guam talks

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