This week on the show we look at Japan, and the historic changes underway in its foreign and security policy. In March, prime minister Fumio Kishida visited Kyiv, marking the first time a Japanese leader has visited an active war zone since WWII. This comes amid successive changes to how Japan approaches national security concerns. We ask whether Tokyo is moving away from its pacifist constitution? What role has the rise of China and the invasion of Ukraine played? And is this the culmination of former prime minister Abe Shinzo’s vision of Japan as a ‘normal country’?

We look more widely to Tokyo’s tumultuous relations with its neighbours, not just with China but also importantly South Korea. With Fumio Kishida expected to visit Seoul in the next few days, we look at why two democracies, both of which are US allies, find themselves continually at odds.

Joining Bronwen Maddox in the studio this week is Robert Ward, the Japan Chair and Senior Fellow with the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), from Tokyo, Valerie Niquet, a Senior Research Fellow with Foundation for Strategic Research, and finally, from Singapore, Professor Alessio Patalano, an expert on East Asia and academic with King’s College London’s War Studies department.

Read our expertise:

Crumbling nuclear order needs leadership and commitment

Cleverly’s calculation makes ambivalence a clear policy

Turkey at a crossroads

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Presented by Bronwen Maddox. Produced by John Pollock. Sound by Abdul Boudiaf and Matthew Docherty.