Tokyo says the new equipment will help Manila monitor shipping routes that are also important to Japan.
Japan agreed on Monday to give the Philippine military a coastal radar system and surveillance drones to help it track ships, in a grant worth 4.3 billion Japanese yen (€24 million).
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Philippine Foreign Secretary Maria Theresa Lazaro and Japan’s ambassador Katsuro Kitagawa signed the agreement in Manila. The radar will go to the Philippine Navy and the drones to the Air Force.
Japan’s foreign ministry said the equipment would also help protect shipping routes important to Japan, including those through the South China Sea and the Luzon Strait, between the Philippines and Taiwan.
Japan handed over five coastal radar systems to the Philippines in February under a 2023 grant. Tokyo says the new radar will be the first complete defence system it supplies under its Official Security Assistance programme.
Beijing has criticised the programme since its creation, calling it an attempt to build a security network around China under the cover of development aid.
The Philippines and China both claim Scarborough Shoal, where China’s military said it sent ships and aircraft on patrol on 30 October.
In a phone call on 3 November, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi urged Manila to act cautiously over the dispute. Lazaro described their conversation as “frank and constructive” and said both sides wanted to keep talking.
Beijing has separately described Japan’s expanding military role in the South China Sea as destabilising, and has accused Tokyo of using its security partnerships with regional states to advance US strategic interests.
China claims historic rights to resources across much of the South China Sea. In a case brought by the Philippines, an international tribunal ruled in 2016 that those claims had no legal basis where they exceeded the rights granted by the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. Beijing has rejected the ruling.
Japan and the Philippines are also discussing transferring an Abukuma-class destroyer to the Philippine navy.
Their defence ministers said in October that they wanted the handover to take place as soon as possible after Japan retires the ship, which it expects to do in the coming years. Philippine crews would receive training first.
The EU approved a separate €15 million package in July to help Philippine forces monitor the country’s waters.
Its first grant to the Philippines under the European Peace Facility will fund coastal radar, infrared surveillance equipment and training.