The G7 summit which will be held in Hiroshima in May should show a strong will on Russia’s offensive in Ukraine, said Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, pointing out that the aggression in Kyiv is not only a European problem but also a challenge to the very rules and principles of the international community. Speaking to reporters following Friday’s Japan-United States summit, Prime Minister Kishida said, “As a result, (of ongoing dialogue with other partners) we were able to reaffirm our commitment that the G7 will unite and work together to safeguard the international order based on the rule of law. In our coordination in the run-up to the Hiroshima summit, the greatest issue was, needless to say, the Russian aggression against Ukraine, which will soon mark one year since the start,” news agency Reuters reported.
“I pointed out that the aggression against Ukraine is not only a European problem but also a challenge to the very rules and principles of the international community and agreed with the heads of state and government that the G7 Hiroshima summit should demonstrate a strong will to uphold the international order based on the rule of law,” Kishida said, adding, the leaders confirmed they would continue tough sanctions against Moscow and strong support for Ukraine.

He also stressed the importance of standing up to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, saying if a unilateral change to the status quo went unchallenged, the same would happen elsewhere, including in Asia – an apparent reference to China’s vow to reunite with self-governed Taiwan, by force if necessary, Reuters reported.

The Japanese Prime Minister, who is in Washington on the last stop of a tour of G7 industrial powers and has been seeking to bolster long-standing alliances, met United States President Joe Biden for a bilateral meeting and the two leaders issued a joint statement which said that any use of a nuclear weapon by Russia in Ukraine would be an act of hostility against humanity and justifiable in any way.
Hitting back, former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev accused Fumio Kishida of shameful subservience to the US and suggested he should ritually Japanese Prime Minister should disembowel himself. A prominent ally of President Vladimir Putin, Medvedev said the nuclear statement showed “paranoia” towards Moscow and “betrayed the memory of hundreds of thousands of Japanese who were burned in the nuclear fire of Hiroshima and Nagasaki”- in a reference to the US dropping atomic bombs on these two Japanese cities in 1945. Medvedev said that rather than demanding repentance for this, Kishida showed that he was “just a service attendant for the Americans”. Kishida made no mention of these comments by the former Russian President.