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TOKYO (dpa-AFX) – Germany and Japan want to work more closely together on securing raw materials and on defense issues in the future. The governments of both countries decided on Saturday at their first consultations in Tokyo, with which they opened a new chapter in German-Japanese relations. “Today we are taking these good relationships to a new level,” said Scholz. They want to give the already close cooperation a “new impetus”. Prime Minister Fumio Kishida made a similar statement. Several ministers from both sides took part in the deliberations.
The focus of the talks was on the subject of economic security. The main focus is on expanding international cooperation in order to reduce dependencies on individual economic powers, for example when it comes to importing raw materials. Germany wants to learn lessons from its former dependence on Russia for gas, which could only be broken again after the Russian invasion of Ukraine through a tour de force. Japan, which also imports raw materials on a large scale, has enacted its own law on economic security, which the federal government regards as exemplary.