The Pentagon announced that US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin will visit Japan and the Philippines next week as part of his eleventh official visit to the Indo-Pacific region.
The US Department of Defense said, in a statement, that Austin will leave the country next Friday for the Japanese capital, Tokyo, to attend the 2024 meeting of the US-Japan Security Advisory Committee, or “2+2”, with US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, Japanese Defense Minister Kihara Minoru, and the Japanese Minister of Foreign Affairs Kamikawa Yoko.
They will also hold a ministerial meeting on extended deterrence.
From Tokyo, Austin will head to the Philippines, where he and Secretary Blinken and their Filipino counterparts, Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro and Foreign Secretary Enrique Manalo, will meet in the fourth US-Philippines 2+2 Ministerial Dialogue.
The statement stressed that over the course of ten days, Secretary Austin will work with his counterparts from four US allies in the Indo-Pacific region to strengthen relations and support a common vision for peace, stability, and deterrence.
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