US President Barack Obama and Japan’s new Prime Minister, Yukio Hatoyama, have pledged to revitalise their strained security alliance as they adapt to the rise of China, a country set to overtake Japan as the world’s second largest economy as early as next year.
However, the leaders left unresolved a feud over a US military base on Japan’s southern Okinawa island that has frayed Washington’s ties with Hatoyama’s government.
“I told him that the US-Japan alliance is the cornerstone of everything,” Mr Hatoyama said at the start of the US President’s week-long tour of Asia yesterday. “But, given the changing times and global environment, I would like to deepen the alliance and create a new US-Japan alliance that is constructive and future-oriented.”
Mr Obama, on his first official tour of the area, said: “Our alliance will endure and our efforts will be focused on revitalising that friendship so that it’s even stronger and more successful in meeting the challenges of the 21st century.”
His nine-day Asian tour will also take him to Singapore for an Asia-Pacific summit, to China for talks on climate change and trade imbalances, and to South Korea, where North Korea’s nuclear ambitions will be in focus.
Mr Hatoyama and Mr Obama agreed on a plan to review their alliance over the next year, with a view to deepening it as they celebrate the 50th anniversary of their security treaty in 2010.
But this could prove a difficult task as the dispute over the Futenma air base for US marines rumbles on.
“They are both determined to avoid public disagreements and to put off, for a little while, the issues they cannot resolve, namely bases. But they won’t be able to put them off for too long,” said Daniel Sneider, of Stanford University’s Walter H Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center.
Mr Obama said Washington and Tokyo were equal partners already and stressed that the alliance was strong and vital.
But he made clear that he wants Tokyo to implement a 2006 deal under which Futenma, located in a crowded part of Okinawa, would be closed and replaced with a facility in a remoter part of the island.
Replacing Futenma is a prerequisite to shifting up to 8000 marines to the US territory of Guam, part of a broader realignment of American forces in Japan.
Mr Hatoyama said before his election that the base should be moved off Okinawa, fanning hopes of the island’s residents, reluctant hosts to more than half the US forces in Japan.
Mr Obama said: “The United States and Japan have set up a high-level working group that will focus on implementation of the agreement that our two governments reached with respect to the restructuring of the US forces in Okinawa.”
Mr Hatoyama echoed Mr Obama’s desire for an early solution but said finding one would not be easy.
The two leaders sought to stress the positive, agreeing to cooperate in fighting global warming and promoting nuclear disarmament, while calling on North Korea to re-join stalled six-party talks on its nuclear arms programme.
But while the leaders found common ground, they have their work cut out to reframe the alliance to adjust to changing regional and global dynamics. There are fears in Japan that Washington will cosy up to Beijing. –Reuters
