Japan to Provide Drone Detection Systems to Ukraine, Kishida Says

By Hirotaka Kuriyama / Yomiuri Shimbun Staff Writer

13:22 JST, July 13, 2023

VILNIUS — Japan will provide war-torn Ukraine with nonlethal equipment, including a system to detect drones, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said Wednesday during a speech at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization summit meeting.

“The security of Europe and the Indo-Pacific are inseparable,” he said in Lithuania’s capital, where the NATO meeting took place. “The invasion of Ukraine is not a problem in Europe alone.”

The equipment will be provided from $30 million (about ¥4 billion) that Japan contributed to NATO’s trust fund.

In his speech, Kishida said he “welcomes the fact that our European comrades are becoming more involved in the Indo-Pacific.”

Kishida and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg agreed on the Japan-NATO Individually Tailored Partnership Program, a new framework cooperation document that specified 16 areas of cooperation, including cyberspace and outer space.