(KUNA) -- Japan's Air Self-Defense Force (ASDF) will expand its airlift support in Iraq even after pulling its ground troops out of the southern Iraqi city of Samawah, Defense Agency Director General Fukushiro Nukaga said Tuesday. "The ASDF activities are legally allowed until December, so we will consider the activities in response to requests from the United Nations and others until then," Nukaga told a press conference, adding that Tokyo will decide whether to extend the mission when the deadline approaches.Earlier in the day, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi announced a plan to withdraw the Ground Self-Defense Force (GSDF) troops from Samawah, ending their aid and reconstruction mission in the war-ravaged country, which began in January 2004 under a special law. According to the agency, the ASDF will form a new team in charge of airlifting supplies and personnel to Baghdad and Irbil, which are considered more dangerous than the southern Iraqi region.
General Hajime Massaki, the SDF Joint Staff chief, acknowledged that the risk levels remain high in the Iraqi capital area and that more caution needs to be placed as one goes further north in Iraq. "We will have to deal with the matter by being double careful and conducting activities such as repeating training for measures the ASDF is now equipped with to deal with the various threats," Massaki added. The ASDF currently has a 200-member unit stationed in Kuwait with three C-130 transport planes to mainly deliver supplies to GSDF troops involved in a non-combat reconstruction mission in Samawah. Since March 2004, it has been providing transport flights between Ali Al-Salem Air Base in western Kuwait and the southern Iraqi destinations of Talil and Basra.