Iwakuni residents protest against US military housing construction

Japan Press Weekly

Japan Press Service Co., Ltd. is the only news agency providing information of progressive, democratic movements in Japan

Iwakuni residents protest against US military housing construction

Residents of Iwakuni City on September 1 conducted a sit-in protest against the construction of an off-base U.S. military housing complex. The city hosts the U.S. Marine Corps Iwakuni Air Station.

A new offshore runway has just been opened on the Iwakuni base, where a carrier-borne aircraft wing is planned to be relocated from the U.S. Naval Atsugi Base in Kanagawa Prefecture as part of the realignment of the U.S. forces in Japan.

Yamaguchi prefecture leveled Mount Atago in Iwakuni City and used the earth from the mountain to reclaim land in the waters off Iwakuni base to build the new runway. In 1998, it began construction of housing units for residents at the Atago site.

However, it cancelled the project in 2007 due to a decline in demand for houses. In order to make up for the deficit, the prefectural and city governments requested the Defense Ministry to purchase the site.

The central government then decided to build a housing complex there for U.S. military personnel coming from Atsugi.

Former Iwakuni Mayor Ihara Katsusuke, who attended the sit-in, said that the Atago site should be for the use of civilian residents. “Once U.S. military facilities are built, the area will have extraterritorial rights where residents are excluded,” he warned.

Representing a local shrine, sit-in participant Okamura Hiroshi said, “The Atago Shrine and the Atago site is the center of our community. No U.S. military complex should be allowed to be built here.”

- Akahata, September 2 and 3, 2010