OKYO/WASHINGTON – The United States and Japan on Friday voiced strong concern about China’s growing might and pledged to work together to push back against attempts to destabilise the region, including against emerging defence threats.

The comments from the two allies, in a joint statement that followed a virtual “two-plus-two” meeting of their foreign and defence ministers, highlights how deepening alarm about China – and increasing tension over Taiwan – have put Japan‘s security role in greater focus.

In their meeting, the ministers expressed concerns that China’s efforts “to undermine the rules-based order” presented “political, economic, military and technological challenges to the region and the world,” the joint statement said.

“They resolved to work together to deter and, if necessary, respond to destabilising activities in the region,” it said.

The ministers also said they had “serious and ongoing concerns” about human rights issues in China’s Xinjiang and Hong Kong regions and underscored the importance of peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait.

While pacifist Japan retains close economic ties to China, there is growing concern in Tokyo about a potential move by Beijing against democratic Taiwan.

“This is clearly a combined message reflecting a common concern, not a case of U.S. arm-twisting to get Japan to sign onto vague euphemisms,” said Daniel Russel, who served as the top U.S. diplomat for Asia under Obama and is now with the Asia Society Policy Institute.

“In particular, the expression of joint resolve to respond if necessary to destabilising activities comes across as a powerful expression of alliance solidarity and determination.”

Earlier, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the two countries would sign a new defence collaboration deal to counter emerging threats, including hypersonics and space-based capabilities.

NEW TOOLS

Blinken said the U.S.- Japan alliance “must not only strengthen the tools we have, but also develop new ones”, citing Russia’s military buildup against Ukraine, Beijing’s “provocative” actions over Taiwan and North Korea’s latest missile launch. North Korea fired a “hypersonic missile” this week that successfully hit a target, its state news agency said.

Following the meeting, Japan‘s foreign minister, Yoshimasa Hayashi, said Tokyo had explained its plan to revise the national security strategy to fundamentally boost defence capabilities, which he said was strongly supported by his U.S. counterparts.

Prime Minister Fumio Kishida in October promised to revise Japan‘s security strategy to consider “all options including possession of the so-called enemy-strike capabilities”.

Kishida’s government has approved record defence spending, with a 10th straight annual increase in 2022.

Jeffrey Hornung, a Japanese security policy expert at the Rand Corporation, a U.S.-backed think tank, said while options for Japan to use force are realistically limited, a Taiwan emergency would be one potential scenario that Japan could deem as threatening its survival.

“There is no coded messaging here,” Hornung said.

“China is the challenge and they said as much, then detailed all the ways the alliance is determined to work to counter its destabilising activities.” – Reuters

WASHINGTON – President Joe Biden on Thursday accused his predecessor Donald Trump of spreading a “web of lies” to undermine U.S. democracy in a speech on the anniversary of the deadly Capitol attack by Trump supporters who tried to undo his 2020 election defeat.

Speaking at the white-domed building where rioters smashed windows, assaulted police and sent lawmakers fleeing for their lives on Jan. 6, 2021, Biden said Trump’s false claims that the election was stolen from him through widespread voting fraud could unravel the rule of law and subvert future elections.

“A former president of the United States of America has created and spread a web of lies about the 2020 election. He’s done so because he values power over principle,” Biden said. “He can’t accept he lost.”

Biden never actually uttered his predecessor’s name during the 25-minute speech, telling reporters afterward he was trying to focus on the threats to America’s political system instead of Trump himself.

The tone, including a poke at Trump’s “bruised ego,” was a departure for Biden, who has focused during most of his first year in office on pursuing his own agenda. Trump issued three statements in the hours following his successor’s remarks accusing Biden of trying to divide the country and repeating his false election claims.

Trump’s behavior over the past year, like his conduct in office, has been norm-shattering. Unlike other former U.S. presidents denied re-election, Trump has refused to accept the verdict of the voters and pressured fellow Republicans to somehow overturn the results, without success.

His false claims have provided cover for Republicans at the state level to pass new restrictions on voting that they have said are needed to fight fraud. Research shows such fraud is extremely rare in U.S. elections.

Biden‘s fellow Democrats, a few Republicans and many independent experts have said Trump’s continued denials could make it less likely that future U.S. transfers of power will be peaceful – especially those involving closer margins than the 2020 election that Biden won by 7 million votes nationwide.

The speech illustrated that Biden and other Democrats remain wary of Trump’s political staying power. In the riot’s immediate aftermath, even some Republicans thought his grip on their party had been shaken, but since then Trump has only tightened it.

“Our democracy is very fragile, and the cult of The Big Lie is still very much in action with the help of the vast majority of our colleagues on the other side, who continue to try to rewrite or ignore history,” Democratic Representative Pramila Jayapal said at an afternoon event.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi led dozens of bundled-up Democratic lawmakers holding lights in a moment of silence on the steps of the Capitol, part of a candlelight prayer vigil that was the final official event of the anniversary.

Not far away, a vigil at the D.C. jail for the about 40 inmates charged in connection with the Jan. 6 assault was sparsely attended.

“This is not speedy justice,” said L.A. Warren, 65, who had driven to Washington from his Michigan home for the day and said he, too, had participated in the storming of the Capitol. “A year, that’s a long time, when these people – a lot of them, in my view – was trespassing.”

‘CULT OF PERSONALITY’

Just two Republicans were spotted at a House of Representatives session marking the riot’s anniversary: Representative Liz Cheney, who has been shunned by party colleagues after criticizing Trump, and her father Dick Cheney, who served as vice president under President George W. Bush.

“A party that is in thrall to a cult of personality is a party that is dangerous to the country,” Liz Cheney told reporters on her way out of the Capitol.

Dick Cheney told reporters that current party leaders do not resemble “any of the folks I knew” when he served in Congress.

America’s next federal election is in November, with Republicans favored to retake a majority in at least one of the two chambers of Congress. That could cripple Biden‘s ability to advance policy and set the stage for two years of legislative gridlock before a potential 2024 Biden-Trump rematch.

According to Reuters/Ipsos polling, 55% of Republican voters believe Trump’s false claims, which were rejected by dozens of courts, state election departments and members of his own administration.

Four people died in the hours-long chaos after Trump urged supporters to march to the Capitol and “fight like hell.” One police officer died on that day after battling rioters and four later died by suicide. Around 140 police officers were injured. U.S. prosecutors have brought criminal charges against at least 725 people linked to the riot.

Trump remains highly popular among Republican voters and is working to shape the field of Republican candidates in the Nov. 8 congressional elections.

Most Republican officeholders have remained loyal to him, and some have sought to play down the riot. Liz Cheney is one of only two Republican members of a House committee investigating the riot, which in recent weeks has unearthed records showing Trump allies urging him to call off the rioters as the attack was unfolding.

Other Republicans accused Democrats of exploiting the anniversary for partisan gain.

“What brazen politicization of Jan. 6 by President Biden,” said Senator Lindsey Graham, who has reversed his position on Trump numerous times, including criticizing him after the riot and then reverting to defending him. – Reuters

PARIS/LONDON – Qatar Airways is seeking more than $600 million in compensation from Airbus over surface flaws on A350 jetliners, according to a court document shedding new light on an escalating business feud worth $4 million a day.

The Gulf carrier is also asking British judges to order France-based Airbus not to attempt to deliver any more of the jets until what it describes as a design defect has been fixed.

The two companies have been locked in a row for months over damage including blistered paint, cracked window frames or riveted areas and erosion of a layer of lightning protection.

Qatar Airways says its national regulator has ordered it to stop flying 21 out of its 53 A350 jets as problems appeared, prompting a bitter dispute with Airbus which has said that while it acknowledges technical problems, there is no safety issue.

Now, financial and technical details associated with the rare legal spat have emerged in a court filing at a High Court division in London, where Qatar Airways sued Airbus in December.

The Gulf airline is calling for $618 million in contractual compensation from Airbus over the partial grounding, plus $4 million for each day the 21 jets remain out of service.

The claim includes $76 million for one aircraft alone – a five-year-old A350 that was due to be re-painted in livery for the 2022 World Cup, which Qatar is hosting later this year.

That aircraft has been parked in France for a year needing 980 repair patches after the aborted paint job exposed gaps in the lightning shield, industry sources say.

The largest customer for Europe’s premier long-haul jet claims Airbus failed to provide a valid root-cause analysis.

The jets feature a layer of copper mesh under the paint to prevent lightning – which strikes planes on average once a year – from damaging the carbon-composite fuselage, which is lighter but less conductive than traditional metal.

BREAKDOWN OF RELATIONS

Airbus said it understood the cause and would “deny in total” the airline’s complaint. It has accused the airline, once one of its most highly courted customers, of trying to mischaracterize the problems as a safety concern.

“Airbus restates there is no airworthiness issue,” a spokesperson said, adding this had been confirmed by European regulators.

Shares in the European planemaker closed down 1.5%.

Qatar Airways, which originally ordered a total of 80 A350s, had no immediate comment.

The airline has long had a reputation as a demanding buyer, sporadically rejecting deliveries for quality reasons.

But the 30-page complaint details an unusual collapse of relations between two of aviation’s most powerful players.

The dispute widened in November when a Reuters investigation https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/costly-airbus-paint-flaw-goes-wider-than-gulf-2021-11-29 revealed at least five other airlines had discovered surface flaws, prompting Airbus to set up an internal task force and to explore a new anti-lightning design for future A350 planes.

Qatar is so far the only country to ground some of the jets.

Under aviation rules, the manufacturer’s primary regulator – in this case the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) – oversees an aircraft’s design. Regulators in nations across the world monitor local airlines and their individual aircraft.

The complaint detailed how the Qatar Civil Aviation Authority (QCAA) had withdrawn airworthiness approval for individual A350 planes in a series of letters from June 2021.

It said the QCAA had told the airline that the deterioration of airplanes was “disturbing, if not alarming.” The regulator had also said it was “deeply concerned” that safety could be compromised because of a lack of analysis or permanent fix.

It is the first evidence of the stance of Qatar‘s regulator, which has not commented in public. Europe’s EASA, by contrast, has said it has not yet found evidence of airworthiness issues.

Airbus has appeared to question the QCAA’s independence from the state-owned airline, saying the decision to drag safety into a technical matter put at risk global safety protocols.

Qatar Airways Chief Executive Akbar Al Baker insisted in November that Qatar‘s regulator was driving safety decisions and that the row had caused a “serious dent” in operations.

The airline has started bringing mothballed A380s out of retirement as it prepares to cope with the soccer World Cup. – Reuters