TOKYO, May 29 (Bernama-Kyodo) -- Japan's Defence Ministry announced Friday the dispatch of four Self-Defence Force personnel to the NATO Security Assistance and Training for Ukraine headquarters in Germany for the first time, Kyodo News reported.
The command, established in July 2024, has a staff of around 700 and coordinates military equipment supplies and training for Ukraine provided by members and partner countries of NATO.
"Dispatching SDF personnel there will help strengthen Japan's own defence capabilities by allowing it to learn various lessons from the war in Ukraine, including new forms of warfare," Defence Minister Shinjiro Koizumi told a press conference.
The Russia-Ukraine conflict is widely recognised as the world's first full-scale drone war.
"Security in the Indo-Pacific and the Euro-Atlantic regions is now inseparable, and completing all necessary arrangements for the deployment marks a further deepening of cooperation between Japan and NATO," he added.
The four Japanese personnel will begin their one-year assignments next Monday at a US military base in Wiesbaden, western Germany.
Two are from the Ground Self-Defence Force, with one each from the Maritime Self-Defence Force and the Air Self-Defence Force.
Their duties will mainly involve coordination related to support activities, rather than combat operations, the Defence Ministry said, adding there is no physical possibility of them becoming involved in fighting.
-- BERNAMA-KYODO
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