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U.S. to call for Japan missile shield
TOKYO, Japan -- The United States is expected to urge Japan to develop and build its own version of a national missile defense shield in response to the threat posed by North Korea's nuclear program, Japanese media has reported. Quoting a U.S. defense official, the Yomiuri Shimbun daily said U.S. Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith will call for Tokyo to deploy such a system when he meets with Japanese Defense Minister Shigeru Ishiba on Friday. In an earlier meeting with Vice Foreign Minister Yukio Takeuchi, Feith warned that the danger posed by ballistic missiles to Japan was real, the Kyodo news agency reported. Following North Korea's test-launching of a missile in 1998, which shocked Japan and other neighbors when it flew over the Japanese main island of Honshu, Tokyo signed a memorandum of understanding with Washington calling for a joint study of a missile defense shield. Such a system would be designed to shoot down long-range missiles by detecting the launch and then tracking the missile flight path through a network of geostationary satellites. Missiles range citiesBut Tokyo has been reluctant to move the program into the development stage due to financial concerns over the cost involved, and fears of upsetting the strategic balance with neighboring military giant China. The Yomiuri said that during Friday's talks with Ishiba, Feith would stress Washington's view of the potential threat from North Korea which has deployed about 100 Rodong missiles. The missiles have a range of about 1,500 km (932 miles) and are capable of striking all major Japanese cities. North Korea has also admitted to secretly pursuing a nuclear weapons program in defiance of a 1994 pact with the United States and is thought to have work on-going to improve its weapons delivery systems. Japan has only been conducting research on technology relating to the anti-missile shield, including studying a system using Aegis equipped warships. Such a system would use infrared rays and lightweight, low-cost rockets to intercept missiles during their descent stage. The cost of the program would be about 1 trillion yen, or $8.3 billion, the Yomiuri reported. It would also force Japan to review its constitution on exercising its right of self-defense. Nuclear crisis
After the 1998 test, North Korea said it would not test-fire any more missiles until 2003. In a landmark summit in September, Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi won a pledge from North Korean leader Kim Jong Il to extend the moratorium on missile tests. But earlier this week, North Korea's Foreign Ministry hinted at a possible shift on the moratorium, threatening to resume missile tests if bilateral normalization talks fail. Pyongyang blamed Japan for what it called a failure of last week's talks in Kuala Lumpur between the two nations. Both sides clashed and remained far apart on the key issues of Pyongyang's nuclear arms program and Tokyo's demand that children of Japanese abductees visiting Japan be allowed to join them. (N. Korea threatens missile tests) The North Korean nuclear admission has drawn U.S., Japanese and South Korean leaders to demand Pyongyang immediately dismantle its nuclear program -- a stance that has received support from other Asian countries, including China, at the recent ASEAN summit held in Phnom Penh. In 1994, North Korea agreed to freeze an earlier nuclear program. In return, the United States promised to provide fuel oil and build two safer nuclear reactors. But the oil deliveries were frequently delayed, and work on the reactor site is years behind schedule. North Korea claims it was Washington that violated agreements, not Pyongyang.
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