Japan wants to move up plans for setting up missile interceptors, Defence Minister Fumio Kyuma was quoted as saying on Saturday, as Tokyo tries to beef up defences against its unpredictable neighbour North Korea.
Kyuma said in an interview with the Nikkei newspaper that he would discuss with key security ally the United States how to speed up deployment, now aimed to be completed by the fiscal year ending in March 2011. "We would like the United States to accelerate production," Kyuma was quoted as saying. Kyuma and Foreign Minister Taro Aso are expected to meet their US counterparts, Robert Gates and Condoleezza Rice, in early May after a leaders' summit in the United States next week.
Japan trucked its first ballistic missile interceptors to an airforce base north of Tokyo last month, rushing the equipment into service a year ahead of schedule after North Korea last year fired missiles and tested a nuclear device.
Plans to deploy the Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) launchers, capable of shooting down incoming missiles in the final stage of flight as they near their target, was first sparked by Pyongyang's firing of a ballistic missile in 1998 that flew over Japan.
Japan is also set to equip its warships with ship-based Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) interceptors, intended to shoot down ballistic missiles in the mid-phase of flight while outside the earth's atmosphere. Kyuma was also quoted as saying that Tokyo would ask Washington for information on its lineup of fighter planes as it seeks to choose new equipment next summer.