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For Japan, U.S. President Joe Biden's comment he would be willing to use force to defend Taiwan signalled no formal change in policy. But behind the scenes in Tokyo, it was seen as a welcome warning at a time of growing alarm over China.

Biden's remark on Monday - during his first Asia visit since taking office - appeared to stretch the limits of the U.S. policy of "strategic ambiguity" toward self-ruled Taiwan, to China's anger.

While the United States has a commitment under its Taiwan Relations Act "to help provide Taiwan the means to defend itself", it has long declined to make clear how it might react in the event of a Chinese attack on the island.

An aide to Biden later said his comment represented no change in the American stance toward the island, which China claims as its own. 

Officially, Japan took a similar line. Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said on Tuesday there was no change in the allies' position on Taiwan, although he declined to comment on Biden's remark.

But some senior members of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) welcomed the comment, which was seen as dispelling doubt about whether the United States would really act in a time of crisis.

"The remark goes far beyond the ambiguous strategy of past administrations. This will contribute to peace and stability in the Taiwan straits," Masahisa Sato, a former deputy defence minister and well-known LDP hawk, said in a blog post.

"There is a lot of praise for this within the party."

Keisuke Suzuki, a former deputy foreign minister praised Biden's comment as "very important and timely" in a post on Twitter.

For Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, who stood next to Biden when he spoke, the safety of Taiwan is vital. Taiwan and Japan are part of an island chain that hems in Chinese forces. Losing Taiwan would breach that line and be seen as a threat to Japan.

"To deter China from embarking on adventurous military actions should remain the most important task," said Tomohiko Taniguchi, who was an adviser to former prime minister Shinzo Abe. Biden's comments were "welcome to Japan, Taiwan, and to the Indo-Pacific region", he said.

Countering China's growing military and economic influence in the Indo-Pacific region has been the overarching theme of Biden's visit.

The president, advisers and analysts have said, came to Asia with a clear message to China: don't try what Russia did to Ukraine anywhere in Asia, and especially not to Taiwan.

"For the United States to say it would act in an emergency is not a bad thing for us," an LDP official who works for an influential lawmaker told Reuters on condition he was not identified.

IT'S COMPLICATED

Japan has a complicated relationship with China, which is both its biggest export market and its biggest source of imports. For years, Japanese companies have built deep supply chains in China, although the Japanese government now wants them to bring some manufacturing home.

A Chinese invasion of Taiwan could also disrupt sea lanes that Japan uses to carry goods to much of the rest of the world, and to bring in the oil from the Middle East that powers the world's number three economy.

"If Taiwan was occupied, Japan could be seriously damaged because our sea lanes are near Taiwan," said retired admiral Katsutoshi Kawano, who served as chief of the Japanese Self-Defence Forces' Joint Staff for five years until 2019.

Biden's comment would help deter China from attacking Taiwan, he said.

Japan's expressed its concern about Taiwan in its latest annual defence white paper, noting a "sense of crisis" about Taiwan and the threat Chinese forces posed to it.

In the weeks since the attack on Ukraine, which Russia calls a "special operation," Kishida has also warned of increasingly fragile security in East Asia.

China has described its manoeuvres around Taiwan, which have included regular incursions by its aircraft into Taiwan's air defence zone, as normal military activity.

On Friday, Taiwan's air force scrambled planes to warn away 18 Chinese aircraft, Taiwan's defence ministry said, part of what has become a regular pattern that has angered the government in Taipei.

As Chinese planes and ships around Japan also increase in number, Japan is raising defence spending, with Kishida's party pushing for it to double to 2% of gross domestic product.

Even that, however, will not match the pace of increasing military spending by China, which is already almost five times higher. For decades Japan has limited itself to short-range weapons because its pacifist constitution bars it from waging foreign wars.

Those constraints mean Japan would likely rely on its U.S. ally to fight in Taiwan, while it hosts and supports the surge in troops, planes and ships that would be needed to defeat China.(Reuters)

China and Russia's air forces conducted a joint aerial patrol on Tuesday over the Sea of Japan, East China Sea and the Western Pacific, China's defence ministry said.

The patrol, the first since Russia's invasion of Ukraine, was part of an annual military exercise, the ministry said on its official website.

The two countries had previously held such patrols in 2019, 2020 and 2021 but in the latter half of the year.

Russia has faced a barrage of sanctions from Western countries over its Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine, which it calls a "special military operation". Beijing has not condemned Russia's attack and does not call it an invasion, but has urged a negotiated solution (Reuters)

A joint strategic bomber exercise by Russia and China in East Asia on Tuesday shows the depth of the two countries' alignment, a senior U.S. administration official said.

Russia's defense ministry earlier confirmed the joint patrol, which it said lasted 13 hours over the Japanese and East China seas and involved Russian Tu-95 and Chinese Xian H-6 strategic bombers. 

Planes from the Japanese and South Korean air force shadowed the Russian and Chinese jets for part of the exercise, Russia said.

The move marks the first joint military exercise by China and Russia since Moscow invaded Ukraine on Feb. 24, according to the U.S. official, and it comes at the tail end of U.S. President Joe Biden's trip to the region.

"We think it shows that China continues to be willing to closely align themselves with Russia, including through military cooperation," the official said, adding that such actions must be planned well in advance.

"China is not walking away from Russia. Instead, the exercise shows that China is ready to help Russia defend its east while Russia fights in its west," the person said.

The senior administration official added the bomber drill indicated that Russia would stand with China on its territorial disputes with neighbors in the East and South China Sea.

It was unclear whether the drills were planned to coincide with Biden's first trip as president to Asia, where he has visited allies South Korea and Japan, and on Tuesday joined the leaders of democratic Japan, India and Australia – collectively known as the Quad – for their second in-person summit.

Biden has stressed during the trip, intended in part to counter China's growing influence in the region, that the United States will stand with its allies and partners to push for a free and open Indo-Pacific region.

Beijing and Moscow declared a "no-limits" partnership just weeks before Russian President Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine, and China has refused to condemn the move.

The two countries have conducted such drills in the past, including what Russia said was their first joint long-range air patrol in the region in 2019. In August, they held large-scale military drills in China involving more than 10,000 troops.

U.S. officials say they still have no indication that Beijing has provided material support for Russia's war in Ukraine, a move they have warned could trigger sanctions on China akin to some of the sweeping measures Washington and its allies have taken against Moscow. (Reuters)

The Serum Institute of India (SII), the world's biggest vaccine maker, is considering setting up its first manufacturing plant in Africa as it looks to expand globally after its success in selling COVID-19 shots, its CEO told Reuters on Monday.

Africa was the only continent that did not have its own manufacturing capacity for COVID shots during the worst phases of the pandemic in the last two years, leaving it at the mercy of suppliers from overseas, including the SII.

"It's never been a better time to be a vaccine manufacturer. I'm looking at expanding our manufacturing across the globe," SII Chief Executive Adar Poonawalla said during an interview at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

"There are some great countries out there: South Africa, Rwanda, you know, to name a few that we're looking at."

Poonawalla said he was meeting some African officials in Davos to discuss his plans. Asked about possible investments, he said such projects typically required at least around $300 million.

He did not say what products an African plant might make. Apart from COVID shots, the SII's Indian plants make vaccines for diphtheria, BCG, measles, rubella and other conditions.

Asked about concerns over the rise of monkeypox cases, Poonawalla said he believed the disease was not so infectious. 

"We’ll wait and see even if we want to make a vaccine for it," he said.

Monkeypox is usually mild and is endemic in parts of west and central Africa. The World Health Organization has said it expects to identify more cases as it expands surveillance in countries where the disease is not typically found.

On COVID, the SII has sold more than 1.5 billion doses in India of the AstraZeneca (AZN.L) shot it makes and brands Covishield, and exported millions more.

But as demand has now waned, the company is putting its Indian Covishield facilities on standby and will "not produce anything there", Poonawalla said, while adding it could resume output if needed.

The SII has also pulled the plug on a plan to produce and sell about 300 million doses of Russia's Sputnik Light COVID vaccine. However, it is still making millions of doses of a version of the Novavax (NVAX.O) COVID shot for India and other countries, Poonawalla said.

He estimated privately held SII was now valued at roughly $20 billion, but said there was no immediate plan to go public.(Reuters)