TOKYO, Dec 9: Japan’s cabinet approved a controversial plan on Tuesday to send up to 600 troops to Iraq on a humanitarian mission, the nation’s most dangerous deployment of military personnel since World War II.

It is the first time since 1945 that Japan has sent its troops to a country where fighting is still going on, although no timetable for the deployment was released.

With many Japanese opposed to sending troops, Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi argued Japan had a duty to support the United States in its efforts to rebuild Iraq.

“Japan must be a trustworthy ally for the US,” Mr Koizumi said in a televised press conference, after the plan was nodded through at an extraordinary cabinet meeting.

Heading off criticism the dispatch violates Japan’s pacifist constitution, Mr Koizumi argued the troops “are not ... going to use force”.—AFP