Saturday 26th September, 02:04 AM JSTNAGO —
Defense Minister Toshimi Kitazawa on Saturday inspected the coastal area of the U.S. Marine Corps’ Camp Schwab in Nago, Okinawa Prefecture, where the Marines’ Futenma Air Station in the same prefecture is scheduled to be transferred, and expressed his eagerness to set the new government’s approach to the relocation issue ‘‘as soon as possible.’’
Kitazawa, visiting Okinawa since Friday, told reporters after meeting with Nago Mayor Yoshikazu Shimabukuro that he will urgently discuss how to deal with the Futenma transfer with Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama and Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada to work out an approach. Hatoyama on Thursday that he will not change his ‘‘basic idea’’ of seeking to move the air station out of the southwestern Japanese prefecture.
The proposal goes against a Japan-U.S. accord in 2006 to move heliport functions of the Futenma air station in downtown Ginowan in Okinawa to Camp Schwab by 2014.
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