United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke about a number of current international issues, with Israel-Lebanon at the forefront, at a press conference on Sunday, during a trip to Japan planned to strengthen defense ties between the two countries.
Blinken said that there was “every indication” that Hezbollah was behind a rocket strike in the Israel-annexed Golan Heights that killed 12 young people.
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“Every indication is that indeed the rocket was from Hezbollah. We stand by Israel’s right to defend its citizens from terrorist attacks,” Blinken told reporters in Japan.
The Israeli military said the young people were struck on Saturday by an Iranian-made rocket carrying a 50-kilogram warhead that Iran-backed Hezbollah fired at a football field in the Druze Arab town of Majdal Shams.
Hezbollah has denied responsibility for the strike.
China in sight
The US top diplomat was speaking on the sidelines of a trip to Tokyo, alongside Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and their Japanese counterparts.
They issued scathing verbal attacks on China and Russia on Sunday after high-level discussions on enhancing already close defense collaboration between Tokyo and Washington in an increasingly unstable region.
The four ministers said China’s “foreign policy seeks to reshape the international order for its own benefit at the expense of others.”
They also reiterated their “strong objections” to China’s “unlawful maritime claims, militarization of reclaimed features, and threatening and provocative activities in the South China Sea.”
In a communiqué, they also criticized Russia’s “growing and provocative strategic military cooperation” with China, as well as Moscow’s procurement of ballistic missiles and other materiel from North Korea “for use against Ukraine.” It also expressed alarm at China’s “ongoing and rapid expansion of its nuclear weapons arsenal.”
Blinken said US alliances were all “defensive in nature.”
Japanese Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa said, “We are at an historic turning point.”
China claims the South China Sea, through which trillions of dollars of trade passes annually, almost in its entirety, while Tokyo and Beijing are also at loggerheads over disputed Japan-controlled islands in the East China Sea.
The statement also confirmed US plans to establish in Japan a new Joint Force Headquarters, headed by a three-star US commander, for the 54,000 US military personnel stationed there.
It will serve as a counterpart to Japan’s planned Joint Operations Command for all its armed forces, making the two militaries more nimble in the case of a crisis over Taiwan or the Korean peninsula.
US forces in Japan currently report back to Indo-Pacific Command in Hawaii, around 6,500 kilometers (4,000 miles) away and 19 hours behind Tokyo.
Call for democratic elections in Venezuela
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken also called for all parties in Venezuela to “respect the democratic process” in Sunday’s election, speaking less than an hour before polls open.
“The Venezuelan people deserve an election that genuinely reflects their will, free from any manipulation. The international community is going to be watching this very closely. We urge all parties to honor their commitments and to respect the democratic process,” Blinken told reporters in Japan.
Venezuelans will vote between continuity in President Nicolas Maduro or change in rival Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia amid high tension following the incumbent’s threat of a “bloodbath” if he loses, which polls suggest is likely.
Maduro, who is seeking a third six-year term at the helm of the once wealthy South American petro-state, is accused of locking up critics and harassing the opposition in a climate of rising authoritarianism.
Blinken said the election is a “pivotal event at a pivotal time given the severe political, economic and humanitarian crises the country faces.”
Washington is keen, as is Caracas, for an easing of punitive measures against Venezuela’s critical but severely weakened oil sector at a time of great pressure on crude prices with wars in Ukraine and the Middle East.
Venezuela has also been a major source of migration pressure on the southern US border, a situation experts say will only worsen in the event of a post-election political crisis.
The US has insisted that the lifting of sanctions depends on a fair vote.
AFP
