“Japan and NATO are partners,” former prime minister Shinzo Abe argued during his historic visit to the organization’s headquarters in January 2007. He was the first Japanese prime minister to officially visit NATO. A few months later Abe would address the Indian parliament, introducing Japan’s new concept, “a region called ‘the Arc of Freedom and Prosperity’ [which] will be formed along the outer rim of the Eurasian continent.” This later became the basis of Japan’s ‘Free and Open Indo-Pacific’ (FOIP) vision, outlining the regional concept, “Indo-Pacific” that has since gained traction among policy makers in Europe, the US and parts of Asia. The QUAD (Quadrilateral Security Dialogue between Japan, India, US and Australia) is a notable “minilateral” initiative based on this new concept. Read on here.