The Department of National Defense (DND) will send a team to Japan to tackle the draft of the reciprocal access agreement (RAA) between the two countries.

This was confirmed by Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. in an interview with reporters on Friday.

"The issue now in Japan, we are now negotiating the reciprocal access agreement. Our team will go there I believe next week and we hope that we can get a draft soon so we can submit on our end the draft RAA to the Philippine Senate and conversely they will submit it in their Diet," he said.

Teodoro said the proposed Reciprocal Access Agreement (RAA) was among the topics he discussed with Japan’s State Minister of Defense Miyazawa Hiroyuki during the 10th ADMM-Plus in Jakarta last Thursday (Nov. 16).

In an interview on Thursday, Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) Romeo Brawner Jr. said the Philippines and Japan forces can also conduct its joint maritime patrol once the RAA was signed.

"We are waiting for it, we're pushing for that, we hope that the RAA will be signed soon," he said.

It can be recalled that the three-day joint patrol between the United States and Philippines was just concluded on Thursday. Robina Asido/DMS