Russian Security Council Secretary Sergei Shoigu said Thursday that Japan is slowly but steadily ramping up its military capabilities, having already acquired medium- and short-range missiles.

"There is a gradual push for further militarization in Japan. The country is moving increasingly away from the documents and agreements – more precisely, the obligations – it undertook when signing the Instrument of Surrender," Shoigu said at the first International Security Forum being held on May 26-29 in Moscow.

He also noted that a bill to create the so-called Asian NATO has already been tabled in the United States. "The very emergence of this bill is a cause for serious concern for Russia," Shoigu added.

He also warned that the prospect of nuclear weapons emerging in the Asia-Pacific region cannot be ruled out.

More than 150 delegations from over 120 countries are attending the forum to discuss security-related issues, the protection of traditional values, and measures to counter neo-colonialism and neo-Nazism, according to the Russian Security Council's press service.