Britain, US, France to conduct drills with Japan next year as China steps up military activity

The UK is to send a strike group, including the aircraft carrier Queen Elizabeth, to conduct exercises with the US and Japan’s Self-Defence Forces

Japan, France and the US will also reportedly hold drills, amid concerns over China’s increasing assertiveness in the East and South China seas

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The British aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth at Portsmouth Naval base, its home port. Photo: AFP

Published: 10:59pm, 5 Dec 2020Updated: 9:18pm, 6 Dec 2020

The British navy will dispatch an aircraft carrier strike group to waters near Japan as soon as early next year, Japanese government sources said on Saturday, in a rare development that comes amid the growing maritime assertiveness of China in the region.

The British group, including the aircraft carrier Queen Elizabeth, is expected to conduct joint exercises with the US military and Japan’s Self-Defence Forces during its stay in areas including off the Nansei Islands chain in southwestern Japan, the sources said.

This came as Japan’s Sankei newspaper reported on Sunday that Japan, France and the United States will hold joint military drills on land and sea for the first time in May next year.

It is unusual that countries other than those in the region as well as the United States keep an aircraft carrier operational in the western Pacific.

The move comes amid concerns over China’s increasing assertiveness in the East China Sea and South China Sea as well as about its handling of pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong. It could trigger an outcry from Beijing.

During the dispatch, the British navy also plans to conduct maintenance on carrier-based F-35B stealth fighter jets at Mitsubishi Heavy Industries’ aerospace systems works in Aichi Prefecture, central Japan, the sources said.