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Japan to host joint missile tracking drill amid N. Korea threat by Staff Writers Tokyo (AFP) Dec 10, 2017 Japan will hold a drill with the United States and South Korea this week to practise jointly detecting airborne missiles, officials said Sunday amid rising security threats from North Korea. The announcement of the joint exercise, a sixth such drill since 2016, comes less than two weeks after Pyongyang test-fired a ballistic missile which dropped into the sea inside Japan's exclusive economic zone in late November. The drill will be held in waters near Japan on Monday and Tuesday, Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera said as he visited a garrison in northern Japan. It is aimed at "practising tracking an object and sharing information on it among the three countries," said a defence official who declined to be named. "It will translate into a measure against ballistic missiles," the official said. Tensions over the North's weapons programmes have soared this year, with Pyongyang carrying out its sixth nuclear test as well as a series of missile launches in defiance of multiple sets of UN sanctions. The US State Department's special representative for North Korea policy will travel to Japan and Thailand this week for talks on efforts to build pressure against Pyongyang after its latest ballistic missile test. "The United States looks forward to continuing its partnership with both these nations so that the DPRK will return to credible talks on denuclearisation," the department said in a statement. A senior UN envoy warned Saturday there was a grave risk that a miscalculation could trigger conflict with North Korea as he urged Pyongyang to keep communication channels open after a rare visit to the seclusive state. Jeffrey Feltman's trip to the North -- the first by such a high-ranking UN diplomat since 2010 -- also came after the United States and South Korea launched their biggest-ever joint air exercise. North Korea reiterated its view that these manoeuvres were a provocation, accusing the drills of "revealing its intention to mount a surprise nuclear pre-emptive strike against the DPRK".
Tokyo (AFP) Dec 8, 2017 Japan plans to purchase offensive air-to-surface missiles to counter North Korea's rising military threat, its defence minister said Friday, a move likely to stir debate over its decades-long pacifist policy. Itsunori Onodera said the ministry intends to request a special budget for the fiscal year starting April 2018 to purchase long-range cruise missiles deployed on fighter jets. Accor ... read more Related Links Learn about missile defense at SpaceWar.com Learn about nuclear weapons doctrine and defense at SpaceWar.com All about missiles at SpaceWar.com Learn about the Superpowers of the 21st Century at SpaceWar.com
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