Japan should expand its use of overseas development assistance by targeting new regions and projects and consider funding noncombat operations led by foreign military forces, a panel said Thursday in a report to Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida.
If the recommendations are accepted in the upcoming review of the ODA charter, it would reverse Japan's long-held principle of not funding foreign armed forces.
The report observed that military forces are often used in a broad range of noncombat operations, including disaster relief, such as that seen last year in the Philippines after Typhoon Haiyan.