Tokyo - Japan's military is experimenting with a new form of camouflage.
Male Japanese soldiers heading for Iraq on a historic mission over the next couple of months are being advised to grow moustaches so as to fit in with the local people, said a spokesperson at their base in Asahikawa on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido.
The 10 or so women members of the 600-strong contingent are being issued with dark green scarves to cover their hair in accordance with local custom.
Drinking alcohol and eating pork will be forbidden within the Japanese army base, which is to be constructed outside the southern town of Samawa.
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'What a magnificent moustache... He looks just like an Iraqi' "We are not going there to wage war, but to help with reconstruction. The success of the mission depends largely on how far we are able to establish friendly relations with local people," the spokesperson said.
The deployment of troops to take part in humanitarian work after the invasion of Iraq constitutes Japan's riskiest military mission since World War 2.
But favourable Iraqi reaction to the mustachioed Colonel Masahisa Sato, the leader of an advance party dispatched to the southern Iraqi town of Samawa last month, seems to have proved the advantages of facial hair.
"What a magnificent moustache. He looks just like an Iraqi," a Japanese newspaper quoted one local resident as saying.
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