Received Friday, 31 August 2007 15:15:00 GMTTOKYO, Aug 31, 2007 (AFP) - Japan's foreign minister engaged in telephone diplomacy Friday to win support for a domestically controversial military mission for Afghanistan, with Australia and France offering backing.
Japan's centre-left opposition, which seized control of the upper house of parliament last month, has vowed to bring back Japanese ships stationed in the Indian Ocean to refuel jets and vessels for US and other coalition forces.
Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura, appointed Monday in a post-election reshuffle, telephoned counterparts in coalition nations other than the United States.
French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner told Machimura that Japan's mission was "highly regarded," the Japanese foreign ministry said.
Kouchner called the mission "indispensable for helping Afghanistan" and "an important help to French military vessels as well as the international community as a whole," it said.
The ministry said Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer had also expressed his hope that the Japanese parliament would extend the mission, which expires on November 1.
Japan has been officially pacifist since World War II and has extended the mission through laws first passed after the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States allowing participation in the "war on terror."
The Indian Ocean mission remains unpopular in opinion polls and the opposition could theoretically stall it indefinitely through its newly gained control of the
upper house.
US Ambassador Thomas Schieffer earlier met with opposition leader Ichiro Ozawa and warned that scrapping the mission would harm relations between the Pacific allies.
Visiting German Chancellor Angela Merkel met with Ozawa on Thursday and urged him to back the Afghanistan mission.
The foreign ministry also said Machimura on Thursday received the backing of British Foreign Secretary David Miliband.
Separately, Machimura spoke on the telephone Thursday with colleagues from India, Russia, South Korea and the European Commission.
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