TOKYO: Japan scrambled jets in response to Chinese drones 30 times during the past year, the military said, up over threefold year-on-year as Beijing bolsters its air force.
“Overall, we are seeing the trend staying at a high level,” Japan’s military chief of staff Yoshihide Yoshida said at a press conference on Thursday.
In the financial year to Mar 31, Japan scrambled fighter jets 704 times to intercept foreign aircraft.
Of those, 464 – or 66 per cent – were for aircraft or drones that are known or believed to be from China, Japan’s Joint Staff said, down slightly from 479 times in 2023-24.
Of the incoming Chinese aircraft, 30 were drones – up from nine seen in the previous year.
Russian aircraft accounted for nearly all the rest, or 237 times, a jump from 174 times the previous year.
Russian and Chinese warships held joint drills in the Sea of Japan in September, part of a naval exercise that Russian President Vladimir Putin said was the largest of its kind in three decades.
The majority of the Chinese flights in 2024-25 were in waters around Taiwan and the neighbouring Japanese region of Okinawa, Japan’s Joint Staff said.
Beijing has ramped up pressure on self-ruled Taiwan in recent years and held military drills that analysts see as preludes to a possible future takeover of the self-ruled island.
