Permanent Missions

The largest of Japan's missions follows the General Assembly, the Security Council and the Economic and Social Council, and the funds and programs based in New York such as UNICEF and UNDP. Its staff negotiate in the General Assembly's six main committees, including the Fifth Committee, which sets the UN budget and the assessment scale that determines each country's share.

Geneva hosts more international organizations than any other city, and the mission covers many of them: the Human Rights Council, the World Health Organization, the International Labour Organization, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, the International Telecommunication Union, the World Intellectual Property Organization and the World Trade Organization. The work ranges from trade disputes and patent rules to pandemic preparedness and refugee funding.

The Conference on Disarmament is the world's single standing forum for negotiating multilateral disarmament treaties. As the only country to have suffered atomic bombings, Japan uses it to press for nuclear disarmament, the entry into force of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty and a treaty banning the production of fissile material for weapons.

The Vienna mission deals with the International Atomic Energy Agency, the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime and the UN Industrial Development Organization. Nuclear safety has been a major topic since the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi accident, including IAEA reviews of the discharge of treated water into the sea.

Rome is the home of the three UN food agencies: the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the World Food Programme (WFP) and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD). Japan is one of the largest donors to emergency food aid delivered by the WFP.

Nairobi is the only UN headquarters in the Global South. The mission, which shares its address with the Embassy of Japan in Kenya, works with the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and UN-Habitat, the agency for cities and housing.

The mission manages Japan's relations with the EU institutions. Its main files are the EU–Japan Economic Partnership Agreement, in force since 1 February 2019 and one of the largest free trade areas in the world, the Strategic Partnership Agreement on political cooperation, and the Security and Defence Partnership agreed in 2024.

Japan is one of NATO's partners in the Indo-Pacific. The mission follows the alliance's work on cyber defense, maritime security and the war in Ukraine, and prepares Japan's participation in NATO summits, which Japanese prime ministers have attended since 2022.

Japan joined the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development on 28 April 1964, the first member from outside Europe and North America. The delegation, which moved to its present address in June 2021, takes part in the OECD's economic surveys, its work on international tax rules, the PISA education assessments and the statistics on development aid.

Japan joined UNESCO in 1951, five years before it was admitted to the United Nations. The delegation handles nominations for the World Heritage List, on which Japan has more than 25 sites, among them Horyu-ji, Himeji Castle, the Hiroshima Peace Memorial and Mount Fuji. Washoku, traditional Japanese cuisine, is inscribed on the list of intangible cultural heritage.

ICAO sets the global standards for aviation safety, security, air navigation and aircraft emissions that national aviation authorities then apply. Japan, home to two major airlines and busy hubs such as Haneda and Narita, takes part in drafting these rules.

Opened in 2011, this was Japan's first mission dedicated to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. Japan and ASEAN have held a formal dialogue since 1973 and raised their relations to a comprehensive strategic partnership in 2023. Trade, infrastructure financing, disaster response and maritime security are the main topics.

The mission in the Ethiopian capital works with the African Union Commission. Its work is closely tied to TICAD, the Tokyo International Conference on African Development, which Japan has hosted since 1993; the ninth conference met in Yokohama in August 2025.