On May 11 (local time), The Japan Times reported that the Japanese government is analyzing a file that was previously kept secret about UFO sightings released by the Pentagon. Among these are 2 videos recording unidentified abnormalities, also known as UAP, discovered near Japan.
Speaking at a press conference, Chief Cabinet Secretary of Japan Minoru Kihara said that Tokyo regularly collects and analyzes information related to national security issues, including UAP. He emphasized that Japan maintains close coordination with the US and other countries in this process.
When asked if Japan would publish similar UAP files, Mr. Kihara said the government would consider each specific case. According to him, the decision to publish needs to take into account many factors, including the risk of revealing Japan's intelligence gathering capabilities.
Previously, on May 8, the Pentagon said that the publication of the new documents was carried out under the direction of US President Donald Trump, in order to increase transparency to the public. The US Department of Defense said that the new documents allow people to self-assess the published information.
A nearly 2-minute video, recorded in 2023 and reported by the US Indo-Pacific Command, has the incident location as "Japan". In the video, an infrared sensor on a US military platform tracks 3 separate contrast zones, maintaining fixed positions and directions compared to each other.
Another 9-second video, recorded in 2024 in the East China Sea area, shows a UAP shaped like a rugby ball near Japan. The accompanying caption describes the object with 3 protruding parts in different directions, including one part vertical and 2 parts downwards at an angle of about 45 degrees to the main axis.
In 2024, about 80 Japanese MPs established a task force to investigate and collect information about UAP, considering this a serious security issue. This group has exchanged views with US policymakers regarding UAP handling measures.
Last March, this group of parliamentarians called on the government to establish a specialized unit on UAP in the Cabinet Secretariat, directly under the crisis management position.
According to observers, more than 160 files released by the Pentagon have new videos of known witnesses, but have not provided conclusive evidence of alien technology or extraterrestrial life. The US Department of Defense said it will continue to release more documents when the declassification process is completed.
Interest in UAP is increasing in the context of drones and surveillance technologies becoming increasingly popular in the world.
After this incident, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said that it suspected that some objects that were once considered UAPs flying over Japan in 2019, 2020 and 2021, including the area near the Self-Defense Forces base, were actually foreign spy balloons.
