Interviews & Articles

When Italy and Japan established diplomatic relations in 1866, the world was entering a new era, marked by the advent of technologies that revolutionized transportation, communication, and production and by the emergence of an increasingly interconnected international system, characterized by competition for markets and resources.

Today, as we celebrate the 160th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Italy and Japan, we are facing dynamics that exert the same transformative force, through different forms. The digital revolution, the energy transition, the rise of AI, competition for strategic resources and the redefinition of global value chains are shaping a new global order.

In this context, Italy and Japan can play a leading role. We share a responsibility to help shape the future international order. While geographically distant, we are peoples and nations that share fundamental values rooted in longstanding traditions, which allow us to hold a common vision of society.

We also share normative and institutional principles that enable us to choose to strengthen bilateral cooperation and to act together on the global stage to defend a free, fair and open international order, in a context marked by instability, strategic competition and revisionist pressures that undermine shared rules.

On this basis, we aim for a qualitative leap in our relations, which we elevated to a Strategic Partnership in 2023 and which, through the 2024-2027 Action Plan, we intend to develop in crucial sectors. The strong complementarity between our production systems and the quality of our industrial interactions enables us to seize extraordinary opportunities to enhance synergies and boost investments in robotics, emerging technologies, space, clean energy, mechanics, life sciences, and medical industry.

These are high value-added sectors capable of producing lasting benefits and offering effective responses to the social challenges shared by Italy and Japan. Starting with the one that affects the very future of our nations: the demographic issue. Not only in our capacity as the first women leaders of our respective nations, but also given the sense of responsibility that rests on every government, we are determined to share experiences and jointly seek innovative solutions to support birth rates, help families, ensure the sustainability of welfare systems and strengthen cohesion between generations.

By strengthening the Italy-Japan Business Group, the framework for business exchanges between our two nations, we have given new momentum to cooperation between our companies and to mutual investments. Furthermore, the great success of the Italy Pavilion at Expo Osaka 2025 offered a decisive contribution to the advancement of new partnerships, talent development and utilization, and the relaunch of scientific and technological cooperation.

A fundamental pillar of the partnership between Italy and Japan is cooperation in the field of defense and security. The Global Combat Air Programme (GCAP), in which we closely work with the United Kingdom, is far more than an advanced industrial project. The GCAP represents an initiative that strengthens our strategic autonomy, contributes to Euro-Atlantic and Indo-Pacific security and demonstrates that cooperation among like-minded nations is the most effective response to systemic risks and threats.

Alongside defense, scientific and technological cooperation plays a central role. In an era of major transformations and disruptive innovations, such as the rapid development of artificial intelligence, cooperation among technologically advanced like-minded nations is essential to ensure that progress is safe, secure and trustworthy, guided by ethical principles, and in service of the individual.

Our bilateral strategic convergence is reflected in our commitment to strengthen coordination within the main multilateral organizations and fora, from the G7 to the United Nations, and to uphold an international order based on shared rules and the rule of law.

A distinctive element of this vision is the desire to increasingly engage across the broader Mediterranean and the Indo-Pacific, geopolitical spaces that are central to global balances. In this shared vision, economic security is gaining ever greater importance. We are convinced that it is essential to develop interconnections and make the supply chains more robust, secure, and resilient to external shocks. At the same time, we intend to continue working to enhance the competitiveness of our companies, countering unfair economic practices that distort markets and ensuring that they can operate on a level playing field, because trade can only be free if it is also fair.

Our shared vision also extends toward the Global South including Africa. Italy's Mattei Plan strategy and Japan's TICAD experience share commonalities: equal and mutually beneficial cooperation, based on co-creating solutions and investments capable of generating long-term prosperity.

Italy and Japan are determined to build a future of security, peace, prosperity, and stability. At this historic moment of the 160th anniversary of diplomatic relations between our two countries, we deeply acknowledge the great responsibility entrusted to us by our citizens, and we are committed to fulfilling it to the best of our abilities. Italy and Japan are great, creative, and innovative nations, and together, we can become protagonists in a future of shared progress.