US, Japan, Australia, Philippines should form defense pact: ex-official
While the idea is similar to the "Asian NATO" previously proposed by Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, Ely Ratner envisions a narrower grouping.
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The Diplomat
an hour ago
- The Diplomat
CEAPAD and Japan's Cautious Approach to Palestine
There is a growing push by G-7 member states to frame Palestinian recognition as diplomatic censure of Israel's conduct in Gaza. France has pledged unconditional recognition; the United Kingdom has announced plans to recognize Palestine at the United Nations General Assembly absent 'substantive steps' toward a ceasefire; and Canada has joined the chorus, conditional on Palestinian Authority reforms. Rather than aligning with this momentum, Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Hayashi Yoshimasa reiterated Tokyo's commitment to 'supporting progress for peace,' including 'the appropriate timing and methods' for advancing that goal. This careful positioning echoes earlier remarks by Japanese Foreign Minister Iwaya Takeshi, who reaffirmed Japan's longstanding support for a two-state solution and spotlighted Japan's flagship mechanism to channel aid and foster peace: the Conference on Cooperation among East Asian Countries for Palestinian Development (CEAPAD). Technocratic and apolitical by design, CEAPAD encapsulates Japan's longstanding approach to the Israel-Palestine issue – cautious, development-oriented, and rooted in quiet multilateralism. This preference has shaped Japan's engagement since it became one of the most steadfast bilateral supporters of Palestinian development among G-7 nations, as reflected in its extensive aid portfolio – over $2.6 billion disbursed to date, including $230 million since October 2023 alone. In March 2025, Japan, for the first time, received wounded Palestinians for medical treatment. Tokyo's approach, though consistent, now stands in sharper relief as global diplomacy recalibrates in response to the Gaza War's devastation. CEAPAD was launched in 2013, during a window of relative diplomatic opportunity shaped by the Arab Spring's aftermath and the Obama administration's cautious optimism. More than a decade later, the conflict-averse logic underpinning CEAPAD remains unchanged. Its fourth meeting (CEAPAD IV) was held in Kuala Lumpur in July 2025 – nearly two years after an attack on Israelis by Hamas triggered a massive Israeli invasion that has killed over 63,000 people. Yet despite the ongoing conflict, the forum – attended by Japan, ASEAN states, South Korea, Palestine, and the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) – offered little beyond routine calls for humanitarian access, reconstruction, and a reaffirmation of the two-state solution. Its 2025 action plan emphasized capacity-building and development support, once again highlighting the Jericho Agro-Industrial Park (JAIP) – a 'first-of-its-kind' initiative conceived nearly two decades ago. Yet, JAIP now reads less as a forward-looking strategy and more as a legacy project, emblematic of CEAPAD's continuity at the expense of relevance amid radically altered realities on the ground. This cautious logic extended to Japan's most recent tenure on the United Nations Security Council (2023–2024), where it adhered to familiar lines: condemning Hamas, affirming Israel's right to self-defense within international law, and supporting humanitarian aid to Gaza. But this formulaic posture quickly buckled under pressure. Japan's initial reluctance to label the October 7 attacks as 'terrorism' drew accusations of hedging, even as officials framed it as 'flexibility.' Japan's subsequent support for humanitarian resolutions – occasionally diverging from U.S. positions – was meant to convey neutrality but failed to persuade. Its rejection of a Russian-sponsored resolution, citing the absence of Hamas condemnation, was widely read in Arab capitals as tacit approval of Israel's campaign, revealing the limits of Tokyo's risk-averse, rules-based diplomacy at a time when moral clarity was increasingly expected. Such diplomatic hedging reflects deeper constraints that have long shaped Japan's role in the Middle East. More than 90 percent of its oil imports come from the region, reinforcing the imperative to maintain stable ties with Gulf producers. Constitutional pacifism limits Tokyo to humanitarian and development roles, while the strength of the Japan-U.S. alliance – underpinned by Washington's staunch support for Israel – discourages political positioning that might jeopardize this strategic cornerstone. CEAPAD, in this light, is not an outlier but a microcosm of the dilemmas that have long defined Japan's regional engagement. Designed to avoid overt political confrontation, CEAPAD now struggles to respond meaningfully to the very crisis it was meant to address. Japan's tendency to follow rather than shape diplomatic responses has cast it less as a principled actor than a hand-wringing one. The dissonance is particularly stark at home. While public dissent in Japan historically remains subdued, the Gaza War has elicited sustained mobilization – rallies in Shibuya, persistent campus encampments, lone protesters holding banners for months. Even municipal actors have broken with precedent: Nagasaki's city council passed a rare resolution urging diplomatic pressure in support of Gaza, and the city's mayor declined to invite the Israeli ambassador to its annual Peace Memorial Ceremony. In the corporate sphere, Itochu Corporation withdrew from defense partnerships with Israel's Elbit Systems in early 2024, with Nippon Express soon following. These signals of domestic unease have not shifted official policy, but they expose a widening gap between Japan's bureaucratic steadiness and the moral urgency resonating across parts of its public and corporate sectors. CEAPAD's internal divisions mirror the broader diplomatic gridlock. While launched by Japan, the forum includes ASEAN members with sharply divergent positions on the conflict. Malaysia has adopted a starkly pro-Hamas stance, refusing Israeli ship entries and accusing Israel of genocide. Indonesia has endorsed South Africa's genocide case and called for Israel's suspension from the United Nations. Brunei supports full U.N. membership for Palestine. At the other end, Singapore and the Philippines reflect a more cautious line, endorsing the two-state solution but resisting punitive measures. Crucially, the Palestinian delegation at CEAPAD IV was led by a West Bank-based minister with no authority in Gaza. Since Hamas seized control of the enclave in 2007, the Palestinian Authority (PA) has played no role in its day-to-day governance of Gaza. Long before the current war, Hamas oversaw civil administration, managed aid, and employed tens of thousands of civil servants – including teachers, police, and bureaucrats – forming the core of Gaza's public sector. Despite the war's devastation, fragments of this apparatus remain intact. CEAPAD, in effect, channels development support through a leadership that has been structurally excluded from half the territory it claims to represent. The PA's legitimacy crisis compounds the problem. A poll by the Arab World for Research and Development (AWRAD) found that only 31 percent of Gazans support a PA-led government, while 47 percent prefer a national unity arrangement. In the West Bank, just 10 percent back the PA, with 25 percent favoring Hamas. Across both territories, over 60 percent of respondents describe the PA as a burden. CEAPAD's continued focus on West Bank institutions and PA-centric frameworks only deepens its disconnect from Palestinian political realities. UNRWA's mounting controversies have further exposed CEAPAD's institutional fragility. It is now entangled in mounting legal and political controversies. A new U.S. lawsuit filed in August 2025 accuses the agency of aiding Hamas and Hezbollah, following the Trump administration's rollback of immunity protections. This follows earlier suits filed by victims of the October 7 attack. At CEAPAD IV, Iwaya reiterated Japan's intent to 'consider necessary assistance' to UNRWA, while encouraging 'enhancement of its governance.' Yet that message sits uneasily with the agency's deteriorating operational environment. Recent Israeli legislation has banned UNRWA operations in parts of East Jerusalem and sharply curtailed its access to Gaza. Japan's temporary funding suspension – later reversed – was emblematic of the reputational fallout that now shadows CEAPAD's legitimacy. This ideological dissonance hampers CEAPAD's ability to function as a strategic forum. The forum's lowest-common-denominator messaging—'two-state solution,' 'capacity-building,' 'aid delivery'—feels increasingly unmoored from the cacophony on the ground. What once passed for pragmatic ambiguity now risks irrelevance. The Middle East that CEAPAD was built to serve has been remapped. The Gaza War has torn open a Pandora's box of intractable grievances, exposing the fragility of long-favored diplomatic approaches to the Palestinian question. Whether Japan is prepared to recalibrate remains to be seen. In this altered landscape, CEAPAD – once a distinctive East Asian contribution to Palestinian state-building and a clever workaround for regional sensitivities – now feels adrift. CEAPAD, and Japan's approach to Palestine more broadly, increasingly resembles old wine in an old bottle: its framework frozen in a bygone era, ill-suited to the urgency and complexity of the present.
Japan Today
2 hours ago
- Japan Today
Japan asks S Korea to lift ban on Japanese seafood imports
Japan's farm minister on Monday urged the South Korean foreign minister to scrap restrictions on Japanese seafood imports imposed after the 2011 disaster at the Fukushima nuclear power plant. Shinjiro Koizumi, Japan's minister of agriculture, forestry and fisheries, held talks with South Korean Foreign Minister Cho Hyun in Seoul ahead of a possible visit to Japan by South Korean President Lee Jae Myung later this month. It is unusual for a Japanese farm minister to meet with another country's foreign minister. The talks took place after Koizumi attended a trilateral agriculture ministers' meeting in Incheon with his Chinese and South Korean counterparts earlier in the day. "I have high expectations that relevant ministries will foster smooth communication toward the swift removal of the ban," Koizumi told reporters after the meeting. He declined to say how Cho responded. South Korea banned imports of Japanese seafood from Aomori, Iwate, Miyagi, Fukushima, Ibaraki, Tochigi, Gunma and Chiba prefectures after the nuclear crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, which was devastated by a massive earthquake and tsunami in March 2011. Seoul also requires eight other Japanese prefectures to provide certificates of radiation inspection. "Trust in Japanese foods has been fully restored," Koizumi said. The Japanese and South Korean governments are arranging a visit by the South Korean president for talks with Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba, according to diplomatic sources. In June, China lifted its ban on Japanese seafood imports imposed in August 2023 when Japan began releasing treated radioactive wastewater from the Fukushima nuclear power plant into the sea, although some restrictions remain. © KYODO
Japan Today
2 hours ago
- Japan Today
Japan's deepening political woes cloud budget, rate hike timing
Japanese Prime Minister Ishiba Shigeru attends a joint press briefing with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen (not pictured) and European Council President Antonio Costa (not pictured), after their meeting at Prime Minister Office on July 23. By Takaya Yamaguchi and Leika Kihara Japan's deepening political uncertainty risks prolonging policy paralysis that could affect the drafting of next year's budget and the timing of the central bank's next interest rate hike, analysts say, clouding the outlook for the fragile economy. Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba is facing increased calls from within his ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) to step down and take responsibility for the party's huge defeat in an upper house election in July and a lower house poll last year. While Ishiba has denied he has any plans to resign, his fading support has triggered inevitable questions about his political future and analysts say a leadership change would likely have implications for the outlook for fiscal and monetary policy. In a meeting on Friday, lawmakers decided to consider holding a rare leadership race even with the party head Ishiba still presiding. Under LDP rules, such a race would take place if the majority of the party's lawmakers and regional heads agreed to hold one. But it is uncertain how long it would take for the party to decide, according to lawmakers and government officials familiar with the procedure told Reuters. That contest could happen in September at the earliest, they say, which would allow the new administration to compile a spending package to cushion the economic blow from U.S. tariffs. But if the race does not take place in September, it may have to wait until early next year to avoid disrupting the government's drafting of next fiscal year's budget, they say. "We would not be surprised if the LDP calls for a leadership election in September," UBS analysts said in a research note. "It seems that uncertainties regarding politics are unlikely to resolve soon." In Japan, the Ministry of Finance collects spending requests from ministries in August and finalises the government's draft budget in late December. The budget must pass parliament in time to take effect from the April start of a new fiscal year. Failure to pass the budget through parliament would force the government to compile a stop-gap budget, which could hurt the economy by causing delays in expenditure. Some ruling party lawmakers say there is no choice but for Ishiba to step down to resolve the deadlock. Having lost control in both houses of parliament, the LDP-led ruling coalition needs opposition party support to pass legislation and budget through parliament. Opposition parties have ruled out forming a coalition unless Ishiba steps down. "Japan needs a stable coalition government. Otherwise, it's impossible to pursue consistent policies," LDP heavyweight Ken Saito told Reuters last week. "It's best for the LDP to seek a coalition partner under a new leader." COMPLICATION FOR BOJ Ishiba's weak political standing and prolonged political uncertainty also complicate the Bank of Japan's decision on how soon to resume interest rate hikes. While few analysts expect the BOJ to hike rates at its next policy meeting in September, some see a good chance of action in October, December or January next year when more data becomes available on the impact of U.S. tariffs on the economy. Known as a fiscal hawk, Ishiba has endorsed the central bank's efforts to gradually wean the economy off a decade-long, massive stimulus as inflation remains above its 2% target for well over three years. But his bitter election defeat has made his administration vulnerable to calls for big spending and loose monetary policy. Many opposition parties have urged the BOJ to hold off, or go slow, in raising rates and focus on supporting the economy. If the LDP were to hold a leadership race, the event could put the spotlight on the views of candidates like Sanae Takaichi, a reflationist-minded lawmaker who in the past blasted the idea of interest rate hikes as "stupid." All this could discourage the BOJ from raising rates in coming months to avoid drawing unwanted political attention. "All we can say is that we would continue to take appropriate policies to sustainably and stably achieve our 2% inflation target," Governor Kazuo Ueda told a news briefing earlier this month, when asked how the BOJ would respond if political changes lead to fresh demands on monetary policy. "It's impossible to predict how politics will unfold, which means for the BOJ it's best to take a wait-and-see stance," said a source familiar with the bank's thinking. © Thomson Reuters 2025.
