Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. agreed Thursday that the two countries will further bolster economic and security cooperation, warning against China's growing presence in the Indo-Pacific region.

During their talks in Tokyo, Kishida pledged to provide a support package worth 600 billion yen ($4.6 billion) to the Philippines over the two years through March 2024 from Japan's public and private sectors.

Kishida and Marcos also confirmed that the two nations will continue their "two-plus-two" security talks involving defense and foreign ministers, while making an agreement to exempt Philippine diplomats from visas to Japan to promote human exchanges between the countries.

Marcos' visit to Tokyo, his first since taking office in June, has drawn public attention as it came immediately after his government deported four Japanese men suspected of being involved in a high-profile string of robberies across the nation.

As a key pillar of bilateral economic cooperation, Tokyo will offer around 377 billion yen in official development assistance for commuter railway projects that connect Manila with its neighboring cities, Japan's Foreign Ministry said.

Other economic cooperation programs range from agriculture and telecommunications to energy security, the ministry added.

In the security field, the two leaders also agreed on guidelines to smooth humanitarian support and disaster relief operations by Japan's Self-Defense Forces in the Southeast Asian country.

The guidelines are viewed as a prelude to a new treaty aimed at facilitating joint exercises and reciprocal visits of their forces to one another's nations, called the Reciprocal Access Agreement.

The two countries affirmed that they will work toward signing the RAA in the first two-plus-two meeting held in Tokyo last April. Japan has signed a similar pact with Australia and Britain.

The Philippine leader's five-day trip from Wednesday is also politically important as Tokyo and Washington are seeking to deepen ties with Manila due to China's increasing military and economic clout in the region, experts said.

A change in the leadership in Manila has encouraged Tokyo and Washington to accelerate plans to improve relations, they said, noting that Marcos' predecessor Rodrigo Duterte had sought closer ties with Beijing.

Last week, Marcos and U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin agreed to allow American troops access to four more bases in the Southeast Asian nation in an effort to keep in check China's increasingly assertive actions over disputed territory in the South China Sea and toward Taiwan.

China, the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia, Vietnam and Brunei have overlapping claims in the South China Sea, a maritime area rich in natural resources that also serves as a critical trade route.

Regarding Taiwan, fears are mounting that the self-ruled island democracy could become a military flashpoint in the region, as Communist-led China regards it as a renegade province to be reunified with the mainland, by force if necessary.

Meanwhile, China has sought to further strengthen relations with the Philippines, with President Xi Jinping pledging to invest about $22 billion in the country, including projects that are already under way, when Marcos visited Beijing in January.