Japan Press Weekly

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2009 January 21 - 27 [ENVIRONMENT]

Residents start sit-in against reclamation of Okinawa’s Awase Tideland

A group of residents on January 21 began a sit-in protest against the government’s Okinawa office for resuming the reclamation of the Awase Tideland on the eastern coast of Okinawa City.

The sit-in was staged at the call of the Liaison Council to Defend Awase Tideland in front of the Okinawa General Bureau of the Cabinet in Naha City.

Putting up pictures illustrating the reclamation project and showing how the Awase Tideland’s coral reef and rich natural environment would be destroyed, protesters called on passers-by to support their signature campaign to stop the project.

Under the temporary reclamation plan to be completed by March, about 155,000 cubic meters of dirt will be dumped into the sea. The project originally was to dump about 4,500,000 cubic meters of dirt that would choke the beautiful tideland in order to develop the area as a marine resort with hotels.

However, the Naha District Court in November last year supported the residents’ demands and ordered local governments to not use tax money to continue the reclamation. No economic rationality can be found in this project, the court stated.

In staging the sit-in, Kobashigawa Tomoo, Awase’s Liaison Council chair, stated, “The cabinet office is going against the people’s determination to preserve Okinawa’s rich natural environment. The reclamation must stop immediately.”

Assistant Professor Kameyama Norikazu of Ryukyu University, as a chair of the citizens group that filed a lawsuit on the “natural right” to safeguard the Awase Tideland, criticized the government for resuming the reclamation work in disregard of the court decision. “We can and must win this legal battle in time,” he appealed.

The Japanese Communist Party members of the Okinawa Prefectural Assembly on January 21 visited the office to demand that the dumping be halted. They also encouraged the sit-in protesters.