TOKYO: Australia and Japan will pursue opportunities for 'more complex' joint military exercises, Canberra's defense chief said on Friday after talks with his Japanese counterpart and the two countries' foreign ministers in Tokyo.

The meeting followed Japan and Australia's signing in October of a security pact on sharing intelligence and deepening defense cooperation to counter China's military rise.

And in Washington this week, the Australian and American defense and foreign ministers said they would welcome Japanese troops into three-way rotations.

On Friday, Australia's Defense Minister Richard Marles said the security pact and other agreements enable the two nations 'to take the strategic alignment and the deep affection between our countries forward.'

'We've spent today thinking of ways in which we can operationalize that,' he said in a four-way announcement.

'There are a range of opportunities that exist [that] we will be pursuing where our two militaries can work closely together to do more high-end exercises and more complex exercises,' the official added.

Marles also said Australia was also 'looking forward to ways in which, working with America, we can trilateralize that, and make that an effort where it is Australia, America and Japan working together across the three domains' of land, sea and air defense.

The United States has been rotating marines since 2011 through the strategic city of Darwin in northern Australia.

Japan's Defense Minister Yasukazu Hamada did not comment directly on the invitation to participate in trilateral operations in Australia.

He only stated that 'for our defense and security, the cooperation between Australia and Japan, together with that of our ally, the United States, and other like-minded countries, is of vital importance.'

Japan, a treaty-bound US ally, has in recent years sought growing diplomatic cooperation with Australia, but defense ties have been more sensitive due to the Japanese constitution, which limits Tokyo's military capacity to ostensibly self-protective measures.

But Japan is preparing to announce an overhaul of its security strategy, including plans to ramp up defense spending by more than 50 percent over five years.