U.S. not adamant about existing Futemma relocation plan: Hatoyama

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TOKYO, March 21 Kyodo -
Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama said Sunday he does not think the United States
is adamant about pursuing the existing plan for relocating the U.S. Marine
Corps' Futemma Air Station in Okinawa Prefecture.
''I think the United States is quite firm in thinking the current plan is the
best, but I think they have a wide range of views so as not to be hung up on
that alone,'' Hatoyama, who is seeking an alternative relocation site, told
reporters in Tokyo.
He said Japan will compile its views on the matter and make efforts to gain
U.S. acceptance, adding he is not aware of how Washington will respond.
''We have not even started'' the process of presenting Japan's proposal to the
United States, Hatoyama said.
The six-month-old government led by the Democratic Party of Japan plans to
finalize by the end of this month its ideas on where to relocate the Futemma
facility, currently in Ginowan, Okinawa Prefecture.
While waiting for Japan to present its views, the United States has repeatedly
urged it to stick to a bilateral deal agreed on in 2006 to transfer Futemma's
functions to Nago, in the same prefecture, by building an airfield in the
coastal area of the Marines' Camp Schwab.
Japan is said to have narrowed down its candidate sites to two -- existing land
at Camp Schwab and an area, to be reclaimed, between the U.S. Navy's White
Beach facility in Uruma and Tsuken Island, also in Okinawa Prefecture.
But Mizuho Fukushima, leader of the Social Democratic Party which is a junior
member of the DPJ-led ruling coalition, reiterated her opposition to moving
Futemma within Okinawa Prefecture.
''We must realize a reduction in the burden on residents of Okinawa Prefecture
as agreed on by the coalition government,'' Fukushima told reporters in
Yokohama. ''Building another base in Okinawa would not lead to reducing the
burden on prefectural residents.''
==Kyodo