Japan Press Weekly

Tweet

2012 July 18 - 24 [US FORCES]

Citizens and municipal leaders protest against arrival of Ospreys at US Iwakuni base

In the midst of protests from Iwakuni citizens, the U.S. forces in the early morning of July 23 began to unload 12 MV-22 Osprey aircraft from a transport vessel at the U.S. Marine Corps Iwakuni Air Station in Yamaguchi Prefecture.

About 600 citizens assembled on a bank close to the base and shouted, “No Ospreys!”, “Take them back!” Another group of citizens were on small boats to stage an on-sea demonstration against the Osprey arrival.

A representative of a civic group, which organized the protest actions, said, “The national government claims that due to the Japan-U.S. Security Treaty, Japan has to accept the Osprey deployment. The deployment, however, would jeopardize people’s lives. What is the security treaty for? Faulty aircraft should be returned to the U.S.”

Governors of Yamaguchi and Okinawa as well as the Iwakuni mayor later on the same day issued protest statements against the U.S. forces.

On the same day, Japanese Communist Party Secretariat Head Ichida Tadayoshi at a news conference in the Diet building commented, “The JCP condemns the U.S. military for forcibly bringing the Ospreys to the Iwakuni base in defiance of opposition from local residents and the rest of the country.”