Japan-U.S. pact on Futenma relocation to be unveiled on Fri.

TOKYO, May 27 Kyodo -
Japan and the United States will release on Friday a joint statement on the
U.S. Marine Corps' Futenma Air Station, saying it will be relocated to the
Henoko coastal area in the same Okinawa Prefecture, although Prime Minister
Yukio Hatoyama is facing fierce resistance from local people and from one of
the ruling coalition partners, government officials said Thursday.
Following the release, Hatoyama is planning to convene a special Cabinet
meeting later Friday where he will try to win endorsement for the government's
basic policy on the relocation.
Although the junior coalition partner, the Social Democratic Party, is strongly
opposed to a specific reference to Henoko as the relocation site, Chief Cabinet
Secretary Hirofumi Hirano said it is ''quite unlikely'' the two countries will
avoid mentioning it in the statement to be prepared by foreign and defense
ministers of the two countries.
The SDP held an executive meeting and decided that its leader, Mizuho
Fukushima, who also has a ministerial portfolio, will not sign a Cabinet
resolution as long as Hatoyama presupposes that the relocation site will be in
the coastal area near the Marines' Camp Schwab, party members said.
Some SDP lawmakers have insisted that the party leave the ruling coalition if
Hatoyama does not change his stance.
The SDP has brushed off the government's latest plan to keep the air base
within the prefecture.
It has also said including Henoko in the upcoming bilateral deal and leaving it
out in Japan's standalone document, as suggested by Hirano in considering
issuing a relocation policy paper Friday, is a ''double standard.''
Fukushima met Thursday with Shizuka Kamei, head of the People's New Party,
another coalition partner of Hatoyama's Democratic Party of Japan. Kamei
persuaded Fukushima to remain in the governing alliance while Fukushima only
repeated her party's position, party members said.
Hatoyama is hoping for a meeting with Fukushima and Kamei to iron out
differences within the coalition.
To break the deadlock, an idea has been floated that the government will
stipulate in the policy document that the Futenma base would not be relocated
to anywhere without the consent of the regional governments to be affected and
the coalition, a person close to the prime minister's office said on condition
of anonymity.
Government sources said Wednesday that Hatoyama is planning not to specify
where the Marine Corps base will be moved when he sets a course for its
relocation late this week, taking into account the SDP's stiff opposition.
In an attempt to break the deadlock with the small pacifist party, Hirano
suggested Thursday that the government may forgo a Cabinet resolution that
requires signatures from all ministers, and prepare instead for Hatoyama to
directly address the Japanese public on the government's latest policy on the
relocation on Friday.
Hirano, speaking at a news conference, added to the confusion by saying he
believes Tokyo's own paper, now very likely to be released in the name of
Hatoyama, is more important than the joint statement of the two countries.
Hatoyama, however, told reporters in the evening that the government's policy
on the relocation will be consistent with the joint statement.
''There is only one way of thinking,'' Hatoyama told reporters in the evening.
''I see no contradiction.''
As for the SDP's discontent, the prime minister said he ''will make efforts
until the last moment to win (their) support.'' Asked if he will dismiss
Fukushima as his consumer affairs minister, Hatoyama flatly denied such a
possibility.
Also Thursday, Hatoyama asked the entire country to have a think about what can
be done to reduce the heavy concentration of U.S. military forces in Okinawa,
when he attended a meeting with prefectural governors in the afternoon in
Tokyo.
Hatoyama asked them to try to share with Okinawa the burden of hosting U.S.
forces in Japan under a bilateral security accord, as his government attempts
to transfer some of the Futenma functions off the country's southwesternmost
island prefecture.
''It would be appreciated if you think of the possibility'' of accepting some
of the U.S. military drills currently conducted in Okinawa Prefecture, Hatoyama
said at the meeting.
==Kyodo