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Dec 2 07:51 PM US/Eastern
TOKYO, Dec. 3 (AP) - (Kyodo) — Mizuho Fukushima, leader of the Social Democratic Party in the ruling coalition, said Thursday that she, as well as her party, will "have to make a grave decision" if the government decides to relocate the U.S. Marine Corps Futemma air station within Okinawa Prefecture.
Fukushima made the remarks, which could be seen as threatening defection from the coalition led by Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama's Democratic Party of Japan, at a meeting of her tiny party in the morning.
She is minister in charge of consumer affairs and coping with the declining birthrate.
The Yomiuri Shimbun
Now that a former senior diplomat has admitted in court that he signed a document as part of a secret agreement between Japan and the United States over the 1972 reversion of Okinawa, it appears the government's long-held stance that such a pact did not exist has been toppled.
Bunroku Yoshino, who was in charge of negotiations with Washington over the reversion at the time, admitted to the existence of a secret agreement during testimony as a witness in an information disclosure lawsuit at the Tokyo District Court on Tuesday.
Yoshino, the then Foreign Ministry's American Bureau chief, had already confessed in interviews with news organizations that there was a secret pact regarding the cost burdens for reverting Okinawa to Japanese rule from U.S. control. But his public testimony in open court carries much more weight.
The lawsuit was filed by a group of plaintiffs, including former Mainichi Shimbun reporter Takichi Nishiyama, who had been found guilty for his involvement in leaking government documents on the secret pact. Group members demanded the disclosure of documents believed to indicate the existence of the secret pact, but the government said it would not disclose them. The plaintiffs then demanded the government nullify its decision not to disclose the documents.
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U.S. disclosure made
Yoshino testified in court that Tokyo and Washington made a secret agreement to have Japan shoulder 4 million dollars the United States was supposed to pay to restore farmland in Okinawa that had been used by U.S. forces, as well as 16 million dollars for the transfer of a U.S. shortwave radio station.
During Nishiyama's trial in 1972, Yoshino denied the existence of the secret agreement. But after giving his testimony this week, Yoshino said, "I've come to believe that pursuing the truth about the past will benefit Japan's future."
Thirty-seven years separate Yoshino's two testimonies, and he likely judged that coming out with the truth would not cause any major problems to Japan-U.S. relations or other state affairs.
A number of official documents that support the existence of bilateral secret pacts have been made public in the United States since 2000. There is no reason for the Japanese government to protect such documents as diplomatic secrets.
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Time for reconciliation
Under the initiative of Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada, a ministry panel comprising external experts has started investigating and analyzing four secret agreements believed to have been made between the two countries, including the one on the cost burdens of Okinawa's reversion.
Following Yoshino's latest testimony, Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama said, "I intend to let the people learn [the truth] by appropriate means when all the facts are confirmed."
We hope the government expresses its view on the matter based on a report to be compiled by the panel next month.
In diplomacy, governments occasionally choose not to make public the content of agreements made with other governments in order to maintain trusting relations and to prevent any damage to national interests that could occur if third-party nations obtained such information. The government needs to explain the circumstances that led to the secret pact Yoshino spoke about.
In the United States, diplomatic documents in principle can be disclosed 25 years after being made. In Japan, the Foreign Ministry decides whether to disclose its documents after a certain period. We suggest that disclosure be made as defined by rules that would limit the ministry's discretion on the issue.
(From The Yomiuri Shimbun, Dec. 3, 2009)
(Dec. 3, 2009)
Dec 2 02:54 AM US/Eastern
TOKYO, Dec. 2 (AP) - (Kyodo) — Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirofumi Hirano said Wednesday that the Japanese government may not reach a conclusion by year-end on the issue of relocating the U.S. Marine Corps' Futemma airfield in Okinawa Prefecture.
Hirano said it is unlikely that the government will make a decision on the relocation issue by the end of the year without holding discussions within the three-party ruling coalition.
Dec 2 02:40 AM US/Eastern
TOKYO, Dec. 2 (AP) - (Kyodo) — The political funds scandal involving the family of Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama has apparently spread to his brother as Kunio Hatoyama, a former international affairs communications minister, has been found to have received a large sum of money from their mother.
Sources familiar with the matter said Wednesday that Kunio Hatoyama has received some of the 3.6 billion yen drawn out of the bank accounts registered in the name of his 87-year-old mother over six years through 2008.
Yukio Hatoyama was reported to have received a total of 900 million yen over the five years to 2008 and some of the money may have been recorded as donations from fictitious donors in his political funds report.
Kunio Hatoyama is expected to have received about the same mount as the prime minister, and the latest findings suggest the total amount given to the Hatoyama brothers is likely to reach roughly 2 billion yen, according to the sources.
The funding for the two apparently started after Yukio Hatoyama's former secretary, who was in charge of accounting for his political funds, requested in around 2002 that donations be made from an organization involving the mother, they said.
Kunio Hatoyama's office declined to comment on the allegation.
According to sources close to the ongoing investigation into the alleged irregularities in Yukio Hatoyama's political funds reports, prosecutors have apparently decided not to question Hatoyama's mother because they think investigations conducted so far have already provided sufficient clues in the case.
The 59-year-old former secretary was dismissed in June after the scandal linked to the prime minister's political fund management body, Yuai Seikei Konwa-kai, came to light.
Prosecutors plans to indict the former secretary without arrest by the end of the year on suspicion of violating the political funds control law.
Dec 2 01:13 AM US/Eastern
TOKYO, Dec. 2 (AP) - (Kyodo) — Social Democratic Party leader Mizuho Fukushima, who is also consumers affairs minister in Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama's Cabinet, on Wednesday expressed her intention to seek reelection as party leader.
While it is widely believed that she would be reelected to a fourth term without contest, there appear to be movements within the minor ruling party to field a contestant to block her reelection bid.
"I will run, so please recommend me (for the party leadership)," the 53-year-old leader said at a meeting of SDP members in the House of Councillors, in which she is also a member.
Those wishing to run for party leadership must register their candidacy on Friday.
Fukushima's move came as some SDP lawmakers have raised questions about her leadership in running the party and formulating policies reflected in Hatoyama's coalition government, particularly the issue of relocating a U.S. military base in Okinawa Prefecture.
While the government continues to review a 2006 Japanese-U.S. agreement, under which a U.S. Marine airfield would be replaced with a new one to be built elsewhere on the island, the SDP has advocated moving the relocation site off the prefecture or abroad.
Some Cabinet ministers, however, appear to be leaning toward settling the issue as agreed between the two countries, with the United States insisting that the planned relocation is the only viable option.
During an informal meeting of SDP lawmakers last Friday, those in the anti-Fukushima camp proposed separating the job of the party leader from that of a Cabinet minister or installing an acting party leader. The proposals, if realized, would reduce Fukushima's standing within the party even if she wins her reelection bid.
Fukushima was first promoted to the current position in November 2003 and is in her third term as party leader. She joined the Hatoyama Cabinet in mid-September, along with Shizuka Kamei, the leader of the People's New Party, which is the other minor party comprising the government led by Hatoyama's Democratic Party of Japan.
Fukushima's portfolio includes the state minister for food safety, low birthrates and gender equality.
Dec 2 07:51 PM US/Eastern
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