
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, July 29, 1993                   TAG: 9307290071
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE: TOKYO                                LENGTH: Short

MINISTER SAYS JAPAN MAY NEED OWN ARSENAL

Foreign Minister Kabun Muto said Wednesday that Japan must have the will to build nuclear weapons if necessary to defend itself against a North Korean nuclear threat, the Nihon Keizai newspaper reported.

Muto made the statement in Singapore after assuring the Association of Southeast Asian Nations that Japan would offer unqualified support for an indefinite extension of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. He also told ASEAN foreign ministers that Japan has no intention of building a nuclear arsenal of its own.

Japan is the only nation in the world to have suffered nuclear attacks.

"There is a clause in the NPT allowing withdrawal from the treaty," Muto said, according to the newspaper.

"If North Korea develops nuclear weapons and that becomes a threat to Japan, first, there is the nuclear umbrella of the United States upon which we can rely. But if it comes down to a crunch, possessing the will that `we can do it' is important." Then, a decision could be made on building the weapons, he said.

- Los Angeles Times

by CNB