Russia condemns ‘militarisation’ of Japan under Kishida defence plan
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Mr Fumio Kishida’s defence plan aims to make Japan the world’s third-biggest military spender after the US and China.
PHOTO: AFP
MOSCOW - Russia accused Japan on Thursday of abandoning decades of pacifist policy and embracing “unbridled militarization”, responding to a US$320 billion (S$431 billion) defence plan announced by Prime Minister Fumio Kishida last week.
“It can be clearly seen that Tokyo has embarked on the path of an unprecedented build-up of its own military power, including the acquisition of strike potential,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
Mr Kishida’s plan will double defence outlays to about 2 per cent of gross domestic product over five years and make Japan the world’s third-biggest military spender
It reflects Japan’s concern that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine
“This is a frank rejection by the F. Kishida administration of the peaceful development of the country, which was persistently declared by previous generations of politicians, and a return to the rails of unbridled militarisation,” the Russian statement said.
Russia said such a move will “inevitably provoke new security challenges and will lead to increased tension in the Asia-Pacific region”.
In a further dig at Tokyo, it said the defence spending increase was taking place despite “the far-from-brilliant state of the national economy and growth of structural imbalances in the state budget”.
Relations between Tokyo and Moscow have been long been overshadowed by an unresolved dispute over a group of Pacific islands seized by Soviet troops from Japan at the end of World War Two.
They have plummeted further since Russia invaded Ukraine in February,
