Answer:
Japan and these nations have common interests in maintaining and developing the free trade and market economy system. It is Japan's basic foreign policy to maintain strong solidarity and close cooperation with these Western democracies on a broad range of international political and economic fields. Article 9 of the Constitution states: "Aspiring sincerely to an international peace based on justice and order, the Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes."