Ben Wallace – 2021 Comments on UK/Japanese Defence Partnership

The comments made by Ben Wallace, the Secretary of State for Defence, on 28 September 2021.

Japan is Britain’s close security partner in Asia, with shared values and common strategic interests. This sends a clear signal about our determination to deepen bilateral defence cooperation, and the UK’s commitment to the Indo Pacific region.

The aim is to create the conditions for a deeper, more regular and complex defence engagement programme, setting out the terms and conditions for UK and Japanese personnel undertaking activity in one another’s countries which makes bilateral activities like training and joint exercises easier and quicker to facilitate – consequently feeding into a more regular programme of events.