US defense budget hike good for Asia-Pacific: Abe

March 2, 2017

TOKYO- Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Thursday welcomed US President Donald Trump’s plan to increase the US defense budget that was announced in his first congressional address on Tuesday.

“If the Japan-US alliance is reinforced through a rise in the US defense budget, that would be a plus for peace and prosperity in the Asia-Pacific region, at a time when the security situation in the region is increasingly severe,” Abe said.

With the policy, Trump may have expressed the United States’ intention to play its role as a leader of the free world in the international community, Abe told a meeting of the Budget Committee of the House of Councillors, the upper chamber of the Diet, Japan’s parliament.
Jiji Press