Obama Pushes Japan as Both Sides Work on Base Dispute

Nov. 11 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama says he expects Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama to honor an agreement on American troops in Japan as the two countries work to keep the issue from overshadowing this week’s summit.

Hatoyama took office two months ago having pledged to alter a 2006 accord that would relocate the Futenma Air Base within the island of Okinawa, host to more than half of the 47,000 U.S. troops stationed in Japan. His Democratic Party of Japan wants to move the facility off the island in response to local complaints about pollution, noise and crime.

Obama, in an interview yesterday with NHK Television, said Japan should keep to the agreement. The two countries later agreed to create a cabinet-level working group to resolve the dispute, which threatens to delay a $10.3 billion plan to ease Okinawa’s burden by moving 8,000 Marines to Guam.

Both sides “will try to de-focus the issue by postponing a final decision,” former Japanese ambassador to the U.S. Shunji Yanai said in an interview. “Under the present circumstances, there’s no other choice. The issue will not be resolved during President Obama’s visit and that will increase the frustration on the U.S. side.”

The leaders will meet in Tokyo on Nov. 13 to discuss the war in Afghanistan, climate change and North Korea’s nuclear weapons program. It will be their second summit since Hatoyama, citing Obama’s call for change as his inspiration, cast out the party that had governed Japan more half a century.

Naval Refueling

Japan yesterday moved to ease any U.S. resentment over Hatoyama’s decision to end a naval refueling mission in support of the war in Afghanistan by pledging to give $5 billion in aid over five years to rebuild the country.

Hatoyama, 62, has called for a more equal relationship with the U.S. and his policies include a review of the bilateral security alliance that next year marks its 50th anniversary. Obama yesterday said that while the U.S. can be patient, Japan should keep its pledges.

“It’s perfectly appropriate for the new government to want to re-examine how to move forward,” Obama, 48, told NHK. “I’m confident that once that review is completed that they will conclude that the alliance we have, the basing arrangements that have been discussed, all those things serve the interest of Japan and they will continue.”

Okinawa Incidents

The DPJ favors changing the U.S.-Japan Status of Forces agreement that protects American troops from Japanese legal prosecution, and Okinawans for years have demanded reducing the military presence. In the latest of a series of incidents, an American serviceman is in U.S. custody on Okinawa in connection with a hit-and-run death of a local man four days ago.

Hatoyama yesterday told reporters that the U.S. should hand the suspect over to Japanese authorities.

Members of his cabinet have given conflicting statements on what to do about the base, further angering people on Okinawa. Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada said on Oct. 23 that consolidating Futenma with the nearby Kadena Air Force base was “one idea.” Defense Minister Toshimi Kitazawa four days later said keeping the base in Okinawa “wouldn’t violate” the party’s election pledge.

Asked about the comment, Hatoyama the same day said, “I don’t necessarily agree.”

The U.S. may agree to relocate 24 F-15 fighters from Kadena to its Misawa base in northern Japan, theoretically making it possible to consolidate the two Okinawa bases, the Sankei newspaper reported today, without citing anyone.

Protest Rally

More than 20,000 Okinawa residents held a protest rally against the U.S. base on Nov. 7, the Associated Press reported.

“We Okinawans feel betrayed,” Democratic Party lawmaker Shokichi Kina said in an interview. “The prime minister and other DPJ officials campaigned for moving Futenma off Okinawa. They should keep this pledge to voters.”

Doing so would scuttle the plan to transfer the Marines to Guam, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said last month in Tokyo. It would also complicate Hatoyama’s stated intention to “deepen” Japan’s ties with the U.S.

Okada and U.S. Ambassador to Japan John Roos yesterday agreed in a meeting to set up a group to resolve the situation. It will include Okada, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Gates and Kitazawa. Okada said Roos told him the U.S. hasn’t changed its position.

Members of the Liberal Democratic Party, which governed Japan from 1955 with only one 10-month interruption until losing in September, have criticized Hatoyama for endangering Japan’s relationship with its biggest ally.

“The government is not fulfilling its responsibilities to the international community, the Japanese people, the Japan-U.S. alliance and Okinawa,” former defense chief Shigeru Ishiba said in an interview. “The most urgent task now is to remove the danger of Futenma as soon as possible and move forward with the relocation plan” on the island.

To contact the reporters on this story: John Brinsley in Tokyo at jbrinsley@bloomberg.net ; Sachiko Sakamaki in Tokyo at Ssakamaki1@bloomberg.net