DEFENSE Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr said an agreement with Japan, similar to the Visiting Forces Agreement between the Philippines and the United States, may be signed “hopefully within this year.”
The pact, to be called Reciprocal Access Agreement (RAA), will allow Japanese participation in field training exercises with Philippine troops.
“It’s still with the DFA (Department of Foreign Affairs) but we want to fast-track it because the Senate is also waiting for it,” Teodoro said on Tuesday night at the celebration of National Day and Armed Forces Day of the Republic of Korea on Tuesday night.
The RAA, which will also be similar to the Status of Visiting Forces Agreement with Australia, is subject to Senate ratification once signed by the two countries since it is a treaty, said Teodoro.
The Philippines and Japan agreed to hold initial talks towards the agreement signing in 2015. However, the discussions have yet to progress into an actual agreement.
Teodoro said the signing of the agreement is being delayed by “some issues they need clarity on but I think it’s going to be resolved already.”
“There is no longer a problem… I am no longer seeing a problem,” he said.
Teodoro said the RAA with Japan is needed so the Japanese troops can have wider participation in military exercises with Filipino counterparts.
In November last year, then DND officer-in-charge Jose Faustino Jr reiterated the desire of Philippines to enter into the agreement with Japan.
Without the agreement, Faustino said, the Japanese are allowed only to hold humanitarian assistance and disaster relief exercises with Filipino troops, or be observers in field training exercises that the Philippines holds with other countries, including the United States.
“That is what is allowed without the VFA,” Faustino has said, adding such agreement is important because Philippines and Japan share a “common interest” in the West Philippine Sea.
