Japan will "definitely" send Self-Defense Forces to Iraq to take part in reconstruction efforts there, Taku Yamasaki, the ruling LDP's No. 2 official, said Sunday.
Defense chief Shigeru Ishiba said separately that SDF troops will initially focus on humanitarian aid rather than security and indicated that a government plan detailing the dispatch will likely come by October.
Yamasaki, the Liberal Democratic Party secretary general, said on a TV news show, "We will definitely send (SDF troops) somehow as we have declared our cooperation with the international community by dispatching the SDF."
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