Tokyo plans to send a small number of Japan Ground Self-Defense Force (JGSDF) personnel to a multinational peacekeeping mission in the Sinai Peninsula in Egypt to help monitor the 1979 peace treaty between Egypt and Israel, Japanese Defence Minister Takeshi Iwaya told reporters on 12 February.
Japan’s planned contribution to the Multinational Force and Observers (MFO) organisation would mark Tokyo’s first overseas operation under new national security laws that came into force in March 2016 and enabled the Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF) to expand the scope of their activities overseas.
“We will likely send a couple of [JGSDF] members to the command centre [of the MFO],” Iwaya told reporters at the office of the prime minister.
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