“Proactive Contribution to Peace” and reconstruction of the legal basis for security
I will now talk about my final topic for today, and that is about the new banner Japan has chosen to raise. We are in an era in which it is no longer possible for any one nation to secure its own peace only by itself.
This is a view shared throughout the world. That is exactly why it is incumbent upon us in Japan to reconstruct the legal basis pertinent to he right of collective self-defence and to international cooperation, including the United Nations peacekeeping operations. On my watch, discussion is underway in Japan.
Japan’s Self-Defence Forces are at this very moment working hard to foster peace in South Sudan, only recently independent, under the flag of the United Nations Mission there.
Units from such countries as Cambodia, Mongolia, Bangladesh, India, Nepal, the Republic of Korea, and China are participating in this same Mission.
There are also a great many civilian UN staffers as well as members of
NGOs from various countries. They are all partners with us in the sense that they are all assisting in South Sudan’s nation-building.
Imagine now that civilians or NGO workers there, powerless to defend themselves, came under sudden attack by armed elements.Under the approach that the Japanese government has taken to date, Japan’s Self-Defence Forces are unable to go rescue these civilians enduring the attack.
Is this an appropriate response into the future? My government is thinking hard about it, and a close consultation is underway within the ruling coalition parties.It is precisely because Japan is a country that depends a great deal on the peace and stability of the international community that Japan wishes to work even more proactively for world peace, and wishes to raise the banner of “Proactive Contributor to Peace.” |
