Germany’s Indo-Pacific push as it gets ready to sign military information protection pact with Japan
As per the sources, Germany and Japan are expected to formally conclude a military information protection agreement as early as next week, which had been due since February 2019.
In February 2019, German Chancellor Angela Merkel reached a broad agreement on an information protection pact with then-Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe during her visit to Japan.
But, both counterparts were unable to formally conclude such a pact in a timely manner due to prolonged negotiations over differences in their legal interpretations.
In the recent past, Japan had signed pacts with the United States and Australia. The new agreement will make it easier for Japan to share military information, resulting in the removal of a major obstacle for exporting defence equipment to Germany.
Japan made an offer to sell the Japanese-made P-1 patrol aircraft to Germany as a replacement for its current planes which are set to be retired in 2025.
But, the German Administration excluded the P-1 from its list of candidates last year because of what it called a lack of an adequate cooperative relationship with Japan. The absence of a proper program for sharing information is assumed as a factor behind the exclusion of P-1 planes, as patrol planes gather and transmit highly sensitive information.
An information protection agreement was necessary to produce real value from the cooperation between the two technological powerhouses, German Defence Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer said last December.
The European nation, Germany, is trying to strengthen its ties with counterparts present in the Indo-Pacific Region.
