Singapore’s Lee Hsien Loong warns against nuclear ‘arms race’ on Asian soil, isolating China during Tokyo conference

Singapore’s PM Lee warned that any talk about deploying or developing nuclear weapons in Asia could lead to an unstable outcome in the region

Lee also urged that China remain integrated in the region, days after US President Joe Biden visited Asia to launch an Indo-Pacific plan that excludes Beijing

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Singapore Prime Minster Lee Hsien Loong delivers a speech at a session of the International Conference on “The Future of Asia” in Tokyo on Thursday. Photo: AP

Published: 12:59pm, 26 May 2022Updated: 7:42pm, 26 May 2022

Singapore’s Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong has sounded the alarm over ongoing public debate on whether US treaty allies South Korea and Japan should deploy or develop their own nuclear weapons.

Speaking at Nikkei’s Future of Asia conference on Thursday, Lee questioned if public discussions would contribute to an “arms race” in the region, amid a refocus on territorial defence capabilities following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

“In Japan and South Korea, sensitive issues are being raised publicly, including whether to allow nuclear weapons to be deployed on their soil, or even go a step further and build capabilities to develop such weapons,” Lee said.

“But if we only look at regional security from the perspective of individual nations, we may end up with an arms race, and an unstable outcome,” he said. “We should maximise the opportunities for countries to work and prosper together, and minimise the risk of tensions worsening into hostilities.”

Both President Joe Biden and the governments in Seoul and Tokyo have not publicly mooted the possibility of deploying US nuclear weapons in the respective Asian countries.

Still talk of such development has come to the fore following Biden’s visit to the countries this week.

In a joint press conference on Saturday following talks with Biden, South Korea’s new president Yoon Suk-yeol said the US president “affirmed the ironclad US commitment to the defence of the Republic of Korea and substantive extended deterrence”.