On February BESA Center delegation conducted a Southeast Asia tour to promote collaboration between the BESA Center and its Asian counterparts. Professor Eitan Shamir, BESA’s Managing Director, began the tour in Singapore, where he met with colleagues at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), a global graduate school and think tank focusing on strategic studies and security affairs at Nanyang Technological University. He also delivered a lecture at the Middle East Institute, National University of Singapore.
In Seoul, Professor Shamir and Dr. Alon Levkowitz, Chair of the Asian Studies Department at Bar Ilan University, conducted a seminar at The Asan Institute for Policy Studies in South Korea. The delegation then proceeded to Tokyo, Japan, where they held a seminar with senior researchers from the National Institute for Defense Studies (NIDS) at Japan’s Ministry of Defense. They also arranged meetings with senior executives from The Canon Institute for Global Studies and The Sasakawa Peace Foundation (SPF). The delegation was hosted at the Japanese military academy in Yokosuka, where they participated in a joint seminar with leading faculty and staff.
The tour concluded with a meeting with Mr. Adachi Masashi, a member of the House of Councillors and State Minister for Internal Affairs and Communications. The delegation discussed with the Minister lessons from the wars in Gaza and Ukraine relevant to Japan’s defense posture.
