Japan and South Korea¡¯s navies have held their first joint training in nearly nine years, the Maritime Self-Defense Force announced Monday, in a move Defense Minister Shinjiro Koizumi hailed as signaling ¡°a new chapter¡± in bilateral defense cooperation.

The search-and-rescue exercise, conducted in waters west of the Goto Islands on Sunday, saw the Maritime Self-Defense Force (MSDF) dispatch its Kongo destroyer and an SH-60K helicopter for the drill with the South Korean Navy¡¯s Cheon Ja Bong landing ship.?

The drills ¡ª the first since December 2017 ¡ª were seen as a key sign of warming ties between the neighbors¡¯ militaries. The rescue exercises, which began on a regular basis in 1999, had been suspended amid bilateral tensions in the wake of an incident involving a South Korean naval vessel directing its fire-control radar at an MSDF plane in 2018.

¡°After a hiatus of approximately nine years, joint training between Japanese and South Korean forces has resumed,¡± Koizumi wrote on X. ¡°This marks the beginning of a new chapter in defense cooperation and exchanges between our two nations.¡±

Seoul and Tokyo had agreed to resume the exercises during talks between their defense ministers in January, announcing the schedule for the drills during another meeting this month on the sidelines of a regional security conference.

The resumption of the drills was the latest signal of Tokyo and Seoul¡¯s improving ties.

Last month, Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi conducted the latest round of ¡°shuttle diplomacy,¡± or mutual visits by the two countries¡¯ leaders intended to strengthen the neighbors¡¯ at-times-tumultuous relationship, by traveling to South Korean President Lee Jae Myung¡¯s hometown of Andong.?

At those talks, the two leaders announced an agreement on energy security as supply concerns continue to rattle Asia amid the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran.

Japan has sought to gradually build up security ties with South Korea, with the two countries holding newly upgraded security talks involving senior officials for the first time last month. Tokyo has already entered into a number of ¡°minilateral¡± groupings focused on security, including those involving Australia and the Philippines, and would be open to bringing Seoul into them as well.?

The two neighbors have regularly held trilateral meetings with the U.S. ¡ª talks that have largely focused on nuclear-armed North Korea.

Both Takaichi and Lee followed their predecessors in putting aside years of acrimony over historical issues, instead focusing on ¡°future-oriented¡± ties and trumpeting the ¡°strategic importance¡± of the neighbors¡¯ relationship amid growing global turmoil.