Japan’s outgoing prime minister to attend Quad summit in US

By MARI YAMAGUCHI
Associated Press

TOKYO (AP) — Outgoing Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga is expected to travel to Washington next week to join three other leaders from the so-called Quad nations at an in-person summit of the grouping. The United States, Japan, Australia and India are promoting their “free and open Indo-Pacific” vision to form a security and economic framework based on democratic values as a counter to China’s authoritarian approach. Chief Cabinet Secretary Katsunobu Kato says Suga was invited by President Joe Biden to attend the summit on Sept. 24. The rare foreign trip by an outgoing Japanese leader comes as senior lawmakers in Suga’s governing party are busy ahead of a leadership election in which he has said he will not run.