Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida urged Americans to overcome "self-doubt" as he praised US global leadership to a bitterly divided Congress, AFP reports.
Warning of the risks associated with China's rise, Kishida said Japan, which was stripped of its right to an army after World War II, was determined to do more to share responsibility with its ally the United States.
"As we meet here today, I sense among some Americans a distrust of what your role in the world should be," Kishida told a joint session of the House of Representatives and Senate during a state visit to Washington.
"The international order that the United States has worked for generations to build is facing new challenges, challenges from people with values and principles very different from our own," Kishida said, speaking fluently in English.
Kishida said he understood "the exhaustion of being the country that has almost single-handedly maintained the international order," but added: "The leadership of the United States is indispensable."
"Without U.S. support, how long before Ukraine's hopes collapse under Moscow's onslaught?" he asked.
"Without the presence of the United States, how long before the Indo-Pacific faces harsher realities?"
While careful not to touch on US domestic politics, Kishida's address comes amid a congressional deadlock over approving billions of dollars in additional military aid to Ukraine due to pressure from hard-right Republicans aligned with presidential candidate Donald Trump.
Kishida met with President Joe Biden, where they pledged to boost defense cooperation, including new trilateral air defense systems involving the United States, Japan and Australia.
Sending a clear signal to China, Kishida will meet Biden again later for a trilateral summit with Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos, who has been the target of increasingly aggressive Chinese actions in disputed waters.
Kishida said China's military actions "pose an unprecedented and greatest security challenge."
China's actions pose a challenge "not only to the peace and security of Japan, but also to the peace and stability of the international community as a whole," he said. / BGNES
