Japan’s Defense Ministry says the number of scrambles conducted by its Air Self-Defense Force fighter jets during the first half of fiscal 2024 fell from a year earlier. But defense officials remain on the alert over the moves of China and Russia.
The ministry says the ASDF scrambled its fighter jets against aircraft approaching Japan’s airspace 358 times between April and September. That’s down 66 times, or 16 percent, from the same period of 2023.
Sorties were carried out against Chinese aircraft 241 times, the largest number, followed by 115 against Russian planes. Scrambles against the two countries’ aircraft accounted for 99 percent of the total.
Chinese and Russian planes also intruded into Japan’s airspace during the period.
In August, a Chinese intelligence-gathering aircraft flew for about two minutes over Japanese waters off the Danjo Islands of Nagasaki Prefecture in southwestern Japan.
Japan says a Russian military patrol airplane also entered Japanese territorial airspace near Rebun Island off Hokkaido in the country’s north three times on September 23.
Ministry officials say they will keep watch on the moves by the Russian and Chinese militaries and continue surveillance activities.