Hatoyama to visit Washington from Monday to attend nuclear summit+

TOKYO, April 9 Kyodo -
Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama will visit Washington for two days from Monday to
attend a summit meeting on nuclear security to be hosted by U.S. President
Barack Obama, Chief Cabinet Secretary Hirofumi Hirano said Friday.
Hatoyama told reporters that as the leader of the only country to have
experienced atomic bombings, he is eager to present the participants at the
Nuclear Security Summit with various ideas to stop nuclear materials from being
stolen or transferred to the hands of terrorists.
''Tight nuclear control is important for Japan's safety,'' the top government
spokesman Hirano also said at a press conference. ''Our country will endeavor
to make the summit a success in cooperation with the United States and other
nations concerned.''
During the meeting, Hatoyama will likely meet with Obama, but only briefly and
informally, as the two governments have given up arranging formal talks due to
Obama's tight schedule, while there is also speculation that Washington has
refrained from setting up an official meeting due to the unresolved issue of
where to relocate a U.S. Marine base in Japan.
''I would like to tell him about the progress'' on Japan's efforts to figure
out where to relocate the U.S. Marine Corps' Futemma Air Station, currently
located in Japan's southernmost prefecture of Okinawa, he told reporters
Thursday.
The issue has been a major headache for the Hatoyama government, which has
promised to seek a relocation site outside Okinawa as an alternative to the
existing plan agreed on between Tokyo and Washington in 2006 to transfer the
facility within the prefecture, in a bid to ease the base-hosting burden on
local people.
Hatoyama is likely to meet with Chinese President Hu Jintao, possibly Monday,
on the fringes of the Nuclear Security Summit.
Among the issues expected to come up during the bilateral talks with Hu are
their efforts to contain North Korea's nuclear ambitions, China's recent
execution of four Japanese nationals, as well as the deadlocked bilateral issue
of gas field development in the East China Sea.
Hatoyama said again Friday he is pleased at China's detention last month of a
suspect over a dumpling poisoning case in 2007 and 2008 and he wants to suggest
that the two countries should continue to cooperate in improving food safety.
The premier also said without elaborating that he is looking to call on China
to resolve even ''difficult (bilateral) problems'' in close coordination.
In reference to the executions, he said, ''It is regrettable, although I
understand that there are differences in the judiciary system (between the two
nations).''
He is also set to hold a meeting with Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung
on Monday afternoon during which they will likely discuss Vietnam's nuclear
energy plant and highway construction projects among other issues, a Japanese
government official said.
Hirano said Friday that Japan is negotiating with several other countries about
possible bilateral summit meetings, but declined to specify the countries.
The summit, which is mainly aimed at strengthening the prevention of nuclear
terrorism, is slated to bring together heads of state from 47 countries as well
as representatives from the United Nations, the International Atomic Energy
Agency and the European Union.
The meeting will be held after Obama announced Tuesday a new U.S. nuclear
strategy that aims to limit the circumstances in which the country would use
nuclear weapons, and after the U.S. president and Russian President Dmitry
Medvedev on Thursday signed a landmark disarmament treaty in Prague.
Hailing the U.S.-Russia pact, Hatoyama told reporters Friday, ''As Japan has
experienced atomic bombings during the war, I would like to continue to take
the lead in creating a world without nuclear weapons.''
Obama proposed to host the first summit meeting of its kind when he delivered a
speech in the Czech capital in April last year on the need to contain nuclear
terror threats facing the international community.
After their meeting next Tuesday, the leaders are set to issue a joint
communique, according to the Japanese official.
Hatoyama will return to Japan on Wednesday.
==Kyodo
2010-04-09 23:35:52


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