SYDNEY: Australian Defense Minister Richard Marles will travel to Japan on Saturday to meet his counterpart, Koizumi Shinjiro, and discuss deepening defense ties, his office said on Friday.
Australia wanted to engage early with the new government of Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, Australian officials said, noting the two countries had a “shared vision for our region” and were working to respond to increasingly complex global challenges.
“Our relationship with Japan continues to grow from strength to strength – underpinned by close strategic alignment, mutual ambition and enormous potential,” Marles said in a statement ahead of the two-day visit.
Japan and China are in their worst diplomatic crisis in years, after Takaichi said last month in parliament that a hypothetical Chinese attack on democratically governed Taiwan could trigger a military response from Tokyo.
Australia awarded a A$10 billion ($6.5 billion) contract to Japanese company Mitsubishi Heavy Industries in August to build warships for Australia, marking Tokyo’s most consequential defense sale since ending a military export ban in 2014 as it steps away from postwar pacifism.
Australia plans to deploy the Mogami-class frigates to defend critical maritime trade routes and its northern approaches in the Indian and Pacific Oceans, where China’s military footprint is expanding.
Marles is expected to travel next week to Washington, to meet with the US and British defense ministers and discuss the AUKUS nuclear powered submarine partnership.
The Pentagon has completed its review of the AUKUS project to provide Australia with nuclear-powered submarines and has found areas to put the deal on the “strongest possible footing,” a US official said on Thursday.
Australian officials said on Monday an overhaul of the defense department will see naval shipbuilding sped up.
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Australian defense minister to visit Japan as ‘strategic alignment’ grows
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Australian defense minister to visit Japan as ‘strategic alignment’ grows
EU regulators hit Elon Musk’s X with 120 million euro fine for breaching bloc’s social media law
- The European Commission issued the decision after a two-year investigation under the Digital Services Act
- They cited issues with X’s blue checkmarks, which they called “deceptive,” and failures in its ad database and data access for researchers
LONDON: European Union regulators on Friday fined Elon Musk’s social media platform X 120 million euros ($140 million) for failing to comply with the bloc’s digital regulations.
The European Commission issued its decision following an investigation it opened two years ago into X under the 27-nation bloc’s Digital Services Act. Also known as the DSA, its a sweeping rulebook that requires platforms to take more responsibility for protecting European users and cleaning up harmful or illegal content and products on their sites, under threat of hefty fines.
The Commission said it was punishing X, previously known as Twitter, because of three different breaches of the DSA’s transparency requirements. The decision could rile President Donald Trump, whose administration has lashed out at digital regulations from Brussels and vowed to retaliate if American tech companies are penalized.
Regulators said X’s blue checkmarks broke the rules because of their “deceptive design” that could expose users to scams and manipulation.
X also fell short of the requirements for its ad database and giving access to researchers access to public data.
The European Commission issued its decision following an investigation it opened two years ago into X under the 27-nation bloc’s Digital Services Act. Also known as the DSA, its a sweeping rulebook that requires platforms to take more responsibility for protecting European users and cleaning up harmful or illegal content and products on their sites, under threat of hefty fines.
The Commission said it was punishing X, previously known as Twitter, because of three different breaches of the DSA’s transparency requirements. The decision could rile President Donald Trump, whose administration has lashed out at digital regulations from Brussels and vowed to retaliate if American tech companies are penalized.
Regulators said X’s blue checkmarks broke the rules because of their “deceptive design” that could expose users to scams and manipulation.
X also fell short of the requirements for its ad database and giving access to researchers access to public data.
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