>Japan and Britain have upgraded bilateral ties to an “enhanced” global strategic partnership after agreeing on a “landmark” deal Thursday to step up defense, trade and technology cooperation. Signed a day before the official start of a critical Group of Seven summit in Hiroshima, the so-called Hiroshima Accord will see the two sides launching new partnerships in the areas of industrial science, innovation and technology and semiconductors, including expanded cooperation in research and development and skills exchanges.
>London and Tokyo are aiming to strengthen their domestic chip production and bolster supply-chain resilience, particularly amid concerns that semiconductor supplies could be affected by a conflict over Taiwan, which currently makes over 60% of the world’s semiconductors and over 90% of the most advanced ones. “As global leaders in science, technology, and innovation, we will work together to maintain strategic advantage, including in emerging technologies such as AI and quantum,” Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and his British counterpart, Rishi Sunak, said in the accord, noting the importance of semiconductors to critical sectors and world-changing digital technologies. Sunak is also said to be preparing a £1 billion ($1.25 billion) investment for Britain’s semiconductor industry.
>In terms of defense, the pact will see London double the number of British troops in upcoming joint exercises and confirm the return of its carrier strike group to the Indo-Pacific in 2025, following a maiden voyage to the region in 2021. This comes as the two countries prepare to launch in Japan the fourth iteration of their joint Vigilant Isles military exercise series later this year. Those drills will be the biggest yet, involving around 170 British personnel. Kishida and Sunak also expanded cybersecurity cooperation, with Fujitsu joining the U.K.’s National Cyber Security Center’s Industry 100, and the two countries piloting a new Japan Cyber Security Fellowship to develop future leaders in the sector, according to a British statement released ahead of the official signing of the deal.
>Britain and Japan, which are already working together with Italy to develop a next-generation fighter aircraft under the Global Combat Air Program, also agreed to consult each other on important regional and global security issues and consider response measures. “We commit to closer consultation on security issues, to carry out an ambitious program of larger and more complex joint exercises and planning, and resolve to bring our defense and security industries closer together,” the two countries noted in the accord.
>London said the increased defense cooperation with Japan is designed to “uphold stability in the Indo-Pacific,” arguing that the security and prosperity of the region is “inseparable” from that of the Euro-Atlantic. Progress was also made on the security front, with the two sides committing to deepening their economic relationship to increase trade and investment, including through the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) free-trade agreement and a closer partnership to strengthen economic security.
>Under the Hiroshima Accord, the two partners will also launch a set of science and technology programs, including a new strategic relationship between Imperial College London and the University of Tokyo to develop a Cleantech Innovation Hub and scale up the rapid development of green technologies. Other agreements included a new renewable energy partnership, aimed at accelerating the deployment of clean energy in Britain, Japan and third countries, and stronger cooperation on tackling global issues such as climate change.
>He also pointed out that Britain’s relationship with Japan “has grown further and faster than with any other international partner,” reflecting Japan’s pivotal role in the Indo-Pacific and their “centrality to the U.K.’s security and prosperity.” Britain and Japan have been eager to deepen their partnership amid shared concerns over the risks and challenges posed by China both in the military and economic domains. At the same time, London has been keen to increase economic growth and foreign investment in Britain as part of its post-Brexit agenda and its “Indo-Pacific tilt” — an ambitious plan for the U.K. to become “the European partner with the broadest and most integrated presence” in Asia.
>Over the past six months, the U.K. has not only launched the Global Combat Air Program but also completed negotiations to join the CPTPP trade block and signed a visiting forces agreement with Tokyo that allows both countries to deploy military troops on each other’s soil. Britain and Japan also emphasized their determination to “strengthen the free and open international rules-based order,” with Sunak saying he aims to “galvanize” international action on economic coercion by “hostile states” and shore up support for Kyiv, as G7 members prepare for escalating military action to counter Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2023/05/18/national/politics-diplomacy/japan-uk-defense-technology-agreement/
I feel like this stuff isn't being covered at all in the press but, fuck me, should we all start learning Japanese? They seem really keen on us lately and we don't go a month without some new agreement being made. Do you reckon Starmer will continue the trend?
It's mostly bollocks. £1bn for the semiconductor industry sounds like a lot of money, but a modern semiconductor fabrication plant costs at least $10bn. Promising to invest 10% of the money required to build one chip factory doesn't really move the needle. China are currently investing $28bn per year in semiconductors. A "biggest ever" joint military drill with 170 of our personnel isn't exactly going to have Xi Jinping shitting himself. The rest of it is just "partnerships" that don't actually commit anyone to anything.
Japan have had an even worse stagnation than ours, with their economy being no larger than it was in 1993. We're in exactly the same rut and have essentially the same core problems. They're a useful co-conspirator, inasmuch as we're both pretending to be a global power while actually being a dying economy with no ideas for how to turn things around.
>>40234 I have thought in the past that we are very similar to Japan. We're both island powers with a very rich culture of our own and an occasionally tiresome arrogance that most countries don't seem to share.
And Japanese fannies really look like that; they aren't pixellated.
>>40233 >Japan have had an even worse stagnation than ours, with their economy being no larger than it was in 1993. We're in exactly the same rut and have essentially the same core problems. They're a useful co-conspirator, inasmuch as we're both pretending to be a global power while actually being a dying economy with no ideas for how to turn things around.
I reckon this is all good background for a relationship even if I'm a lot less pessimistic. Japan has since the Abe been trying to open markets to kickstart the economy, we're trying to do the same with Global Britain and it's all being done within the context of CPTPP that contains large emerging economies and our cousins in Australia and New Zealand. Not ideal to skirt WTO rules using a carpet-bagger-island in the Pacific but even if we'd stayed in the EU we'd still be on the periphery agitating for closer cooperation with Asia.
Without CPTPP we're the third and sixth largest economies working together and we're building links at a comparatively fast clip. Tempest with the Italians is absolutely miles ahead of FCAS and British software with Japanese robotics sounds like a competitive match.
I don't like this foreign troops on our soil business. Both us and the Japanese have to put up with that shit from the Americans, resulting in our teenagers dying on the roads and Okinawans getting raped.
>Getting Britain into CPTPP is “a coup” for British trade diplomacy, said a former senior official at the trade department. But it's a big boost for Japanese diplomacy too.
>Japan worked “really seriously” to get “the U.K. to accept all existing CPTPP rules without any exception, said Minako Morita-Jaeger, a senior research fellow in international trade at the University of Sussex Business School. The reason for that is China. Letting Britain bend the rules would set a precedent, she added. “This is why they do not want to compromise.”
>Canada tried to use those hard-and-fast rules as leverage to reverse Britain's ban on hormone-treated beef. But it backed down after Tokyo worked throughout the start of the year to “remind members of the spirit of cooperation,” said a diplomat from another member country.
https://www.politico.eu/article/britain-join-asia-pacific-trade-bloc-cptpp/
On the 31st it was agreed that Britain will join the CPTPP and official signing will be in July. In a twist of fate we might actually end up in a free trade agreement with China in the coming years, or at least we could if they ask us extra nicely. Apparently Japan will also soon announce it's joining of AUKUS which Canada has already expressed interest on joining on the advanced tech fronts.
Are you going to start paying for your anime in light of this?
>After three years of on-off negotiations, the UK and India have agreed a trade deal that will make it easier for UK firms to export whisky, cars and other products to India, and cut taxes on India's clothing and footwear exports. The deal does not include any change in immigration policy, including towards Indian students studying in the UK, the British government said.
>Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said the benefits for UK businesses and consumers were "massive". Last year trade between the UK and India totalled £41bn and was already forecast to grow, but the government said the deal would boost that trade by an additional £25.5bn a year by 2040. Mr Reynolds met his Indian counterpart Piyush Goyal in London last week to put the final touches on the deal.
>Once it comes into force, which could take up to a year, UK consumers are likely to benefit from the reduction in tariffs on goods coming into the country from India, the Department for Business said. As well as clothing, that will include some Indian foodstuffs, such as frozen prawns.
So apparently it only applies to temporary workers on secondment, and it just means they keep paying into their home country's system and vice verso for Brits working in India. It does nothing to change immigration laws and there's nothing in it that exempts them from other forms of tax, only NI, and it's only a small amount of workers.
I want to believe the Labour man on the radio when he was explaining all that. But UK companies have been outsourcing entire IT departments to India for decades and this does sound like it just makes it a lot easier for them to send those lot's managers over for a few months of training, thus overall, making the elimination of UK workers even easier.
I think what makes me most cynical about it is the position that the Conservatives are attacking it from. Which only in turn tells me it's actually exactly the kind of deal they would have done. Meaning, one that shafts the British worker.
Look at how happy Trump is to hear Starmer sucking up to him from the 5 minute mark on. He even get him to do that duck face when he talks about the exact hour of VE day.
Still at 10% tariffs and apparently we've bought $10 billion worth of Boeing planes but at least we can send steel without tariffs now.
