Italy is shaping its Indo-Pacific technique, and the latest go to of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni to Japan and South Korea is a transparent demonstration. Whereas Rome has but to undertake a devoted strategic doc on the area, the route is clear: Italy is searching for to anchor its function by means of key partnerships throughout an more and more interconnected geopolitical area, wherein nationwide and financial safety overlap. On this framing, the Indo-Pacific is interpreted much less as a distant theater than as an extension of the enlarged Mediterranean, according to Meloni’s narrative of “International Mediterranean.”
Relations with Japan are on the core of this rising calculus. Meloni has now made two official visits to Tokyo in two years, plus her participation within the 2023 G-7 Summit in Hiroshima. This indicators an uncommon diploma of continuity in Italy’s Asia coverage, inserting Japan amongst its most essential non-European companions. Past symbolism, the elevation of bilateral ties to a “Particular Strategic Partnership” displays a shared understanding of interdependence between the European and Indo-Pacific theaters, grounded in protection and industrial cooperation, interoperability and provide chain safety.
In diplomacy, private relationships matter as effectively. Meloni and Takaichi Sanae, every the primary girls to steer authorities of their respective nations, reaffirmed their dedication to proceed working collectively to make sure a Free and Open Indo-Pacific (FOIP) based mostly on the rule of legislation. In addition they expressed their intention to deepen the hyperlink between the FOIP framework and Italy’s “International Mediterranean” narrative, reflecting a shared recognition that Euro-Atlantic and Indo-Pacific safety are more and more interconnected.
The Indo-Pacific, an idea coined by former Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo, captured the strategic continuity between the Indian and Pacific Oceans. From an Italian perspective, nonetheless, it’s now interpreted as extending westward towards the Mediterranean, reinforcing a broader understanding of connectivity between the 2 areas.
Within the safety area, Rome’s rising consciousness of the Indo-Pacific is already translating into tangible protection cooperation and joint workouts. In 2024, the plane provider Cavour led Italy’s first main Indo-Pacific deployment, conducting operational and coaching actions with the Japan Maritime Self-Protection Pressure, together with interactions with the Izumo-class vessels Izumo and Kaga as they transition to working F-35B fighters. The deployment supported Italy’s embarked air element to achieve Preliminary Operational Functionality (IOC), whereas providing operational classes related to Japan’s personal rising provider aviation. An additional Italian naval presence in Japan later this 12 months is anticipated to strengthen regional stability and interoperability.
Inside this framework, the International Fight Air Program (GCAP), a joint Italy-Japan-U.Ok. initiative, illustrates how protection and industrial cooperation can sign strategic alignment and strengthen technological autonomy with out requiring sustained or large-scale pressure projection.
Financial safety is the second essential pillar of Rome’s partnership with Tokyo. Each international locations share acute considerations over provide chain vulnerabilities, important uncooked supplies, and financial coercion. This makes cooperation in superior technological domains, similar to semiconductors, AI, and area, a strategic response to systemic dangers, not simply industrial collaboration. As a core node within the U.S.-backed “Pax Silica” worth chain, Japan affords Italy a long-term anchor for prosperity and resilience. The 2 prime ministers agreed to strengthen important minerals provide chains. Additionally within the European context, these dynamics align with the broader EU-Japan framework, from the Competitiveness Alliance on important uncooked supplies to Japan’s inclusion in Horizon Europe, each aimed toward co-development and co-production in delicate sectors.
South Korea additionally occupies a complementary function in Italy’s regional and international engagement. Meloni’s go to to Seoul, following simply after her Japan journey, highlighted convergence on superior manufacturing, the power transition, and significant applied sciences, whereas additionally carrying wider European relevance.
South Korea has develop into a extra structured companion in G-7 processes and a key European Union interlocutor on provide chain resilience, digital governance, and industrial coverage. Its robust hyperlinks with each the EU and NATO place Seoul as a pure bridge between regional and international agendas. On this area, Rome may help facilitate Seoul’s engagement with European companions, the place EU mechanisms are sluggish or fragmented. Italian diplomacy can thus convert political alignment into sensible cooperation, strengthening Europe’s Indo-Pacific engagement.
Meloni’s outreach to Japan and South Korea immediately helps Italy’s industrial competitiveness and alignment with a rules-based order. As two superior democratic companions, Seoul and Tokyo are central to financial safety and provide chain resilience in sector that outline energy, being the world’s second and third largest semiconductor producers (after Taiwan).
Within the framework of “International Mediterranean” – stretching past the basin to incorporate the Purple Sea, the Gulf, and the Indian Ocean – the Indo-Pacific shouldn’t be a distant theater. The Indo-Mediterranean idea makes this continuity express, linking maritime safety, commerce routes, and infrastructure throughout the geostrategic area connecting Europe and Asia, together with East Africa and the broader Center East. Via the Mattei Plan and its bridging function between Europe and Africa, Italy can place itself as a platform for synergies in extra-regional contexts, significantly for important useful resource worth chains, the place the Lobito Hall, a strategic platform for connectivity, important uncooked supplies and sustainable improvement, affords a very good instance.
In June 2025, Meloni and president of the EU Fee Ursula von der Leyen formalized a sequence of Italy–EU agreements, successfully internationalizing the Mattei Plan by means of joint investments linked to the Lobito Hall. On this context, the Mattei Plan reinforces a logic of trilateral and multilateral cooperation linking the Indo-Pacific, Europe and Africa.
This additionally helps clarify Italy’s selective Indo-Pacific engagement. Rome faces constraints on long-range navy projection within the area, prioritizing safety challenges nearer to Europe, and has sought to keep away from an overtly confrontational posture towards China. Its withdrawal from the Belt and Highway Initiative in 2024 was framed as normalization fairly than rupture, preserving financial ties and limiting political publicity.
Selectivity, nonetheless, doesn’t imply disengagement. Via naval diplomacy, protection and industrial cooperation, and focused partnerships with Japan and South Korea, Italy is embedding itself within the Indo-Pacific’s evolving safety and financial structure in step with its capabilities and focusing the place it could possibly add worth – prioritizing interoperability, industrial cooperation and political coordination throughout areas.
