Japan and the US plan to settle a row over a US airbase this month, largely in line with Washington’s wishes, reports said yesterday, a day before US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visits Tokyo.
Under the deal, expected to be officially announced on Friday next week, the base would be relocated within Okinawa island rather than moved elsewhere, as agreed by previous conservative governments in Tokyo and Washington.
Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama would announce the news at a press conference on May 28, the Asahi Shimbun and other dailies said, citing unnamed sources.
PHOTO: AFP
Relations have been strained between the two allies since the center-left prime minister took power in September last year after a landslide poll victory, pledging to move the base out of Okinawa, where most residents oppose it.
The administration of US President Barack Obama has urged Hatoyama to stick with the original pact, arguing that a strong US military presence is crucial for the defense of Japan and stability in the wider Asia-Pacific region.
Hatoyama appeared to concede that point in brief comments yesterday.
“Now the Korean peninsula is growing tense,” he said after an international panel concluded North Korea sank a South Korean naval ship in March, killing 46 people, in findings that sparked an angry reaction from the communist regime.
“Considering situations like this in Asia, as well as for the peace of Japan, we are making our final efforts to reach a solution to this problem by the end of May,” Hatoyama told reporters.
He was speaking a day before Clinton stops in Japan for several hours on her way to China and then South Korea on a week-long Asia tour.
At home, the festering base dispute has hammered Hatoyama’s approval ratings and provoked mass anti-base rallies, both on Okinawa and other islands that his government has been eying as potential alternative base locations.
With upper house elections slated for July, poll ratings for the prime minister’s Cabinet have plunged from more than 70 percent last year to about 20 percent.
The Futenma base has long angered locals because of aircraft noise, pollution, the risk of crashes and frictions with US service personnel, especially after the 1995 rape of a 12-year-old girl by three US troops.
Hatoyama plans to visit Okinawa on Sunday to explain the deal to local politicians. Japanese Defense Minister Toshimi Kitazawa is set to meet US Defense Secretary Robert Gates as early as Monday in Washington, Kyodo reported.
Under the deal, Japan and the US will agree to move the US Marine Corps Futenma Air Station from an urban area to the coastal location of Henoko.
The agreement may leave open for now a last sticking point, the construction method of V-shaped offshore runways at the new base, the reports said.
Tokyo has proposed building them on pylons to minimize the impact on marine life, but Washington has said this would raise the threat of a terrorist attack on the structure and wants it built on landfill as originally agreed.
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