Biden And Kishida To Deliver Joint Presser Shortly

US President Joe Biden and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida are shortly due to deliver a joint presser at the White House following a bilateral meeting. LIVESTREAM

• A senior Administration official told reporters yesterday that Biden and Kishida will announce over 70 deliverables - “probably the largest set of substantial, significant deliverables that we’ve seen of its kind.”
• The leaders are expected to announce a flagship initiative to integrate the US and Japanese industrial bases and launch a working group to begin co-development and co-production of munitions, ships, and warplanes.
• The pair are also likely to discuss incorporating Japan into Pillar II of the AUKUS defence pact, strategy to confront an increasingly belligerent North Korea, and closer space collaboration.
• The senior official said: “…all the particulars add up to a major shift where Japan… projecting not only into the region and the alliance and its value system, but being a full global partner on whatever happens in Europe, the Mideast, and also the Indo-Pacific.”
• Kishida said in an interview with Nikkei Asia: "I want to stress that Japan and the U.S. are global partners in maintaining and strengthening the rules-based, free and open international order. We will also bolster our defense and national security cooperation."
• Semafor notes: “While U.S.-Japan relations are at a high point, there is at least one source of friction Biden and Kishida will try to avoid: neither is expected to broach the proposed takeover of U.S. Steel by Japan’s Nippon Steel, which Biden recently said he opposed.”