TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — French President Emmanuel Macron has objected to NATO's plans to open an office in Japan, which would mark the transatlantic military alliance’s first permanent presence in the Indo-Pacific region.
The Financial Times (FT) reported on Monday (June 5) that France’s opposition to the NATO plan is “complicating months of discussion.” Macron reportedly spoke at a conference last week and argued that NATO’s operations should remain limited to the North Atlantic, and pushing NATO to enlarge its “spectrum and geography” would be a big mistake.
FT also reported that according to sources familiar with the matter, France did not want to support any measures that contribute to NATO-China tension. Establishing a NATO office requires unanimous support from the alliance’s executive council, meaning that French opposition has the potential to kill the plan.
A NATO office in Japan would support the military alliance’s efforts to expand cooperation in the Indo-Pacific region, which NATO said in April is an important part of its 2030 agenda. Expanding ties in the region was also referenced in NATO’s 2022 white paper, in order to “tackle cross-regional challenges and shared security interests.”
The white paper described China as a challenge to the alliance’s interest, security, and values, while in February, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg directly addressed the security situation of Taiwan. “Beijing is substantially building up its military forces, including nuclear weapons, without any transparency. It is attempting to assert control over the South China Sea, and threatening Taiwan,” he said.
Macron drew criticism in April for warning European countries against following the U.S.’s lead on China policy. "The question we need to answer, as Europeans, is the following: Is it in our interest to accelerate (a crisis) on Taiwan? No," Macron said in an interview.
Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs responded at the time, saying that the French government had indicated support for peace and maintaining the status quo in the Taiwan Strait through recent inter-ministerial meetings and strategy reports.
