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TOKYO: The United States and Japan held talks on Tuesday over relocating an American military base but made little progress on resolving a row that has strained ties between the allies, officials said.
Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama suggested he would follow any decision by the working group, which includes Japan's foreign and defence ministers as well as US ambassador John Roos and US Assistant Secretary of Defence Wallace Gregson.
"Once a conclusion is reached after talks between Japan and America, I think it should obviously be accepted as the decision that carries the most weight," Hatoyama told reporters.
Little "visible progress" was made in their first gathering, with the US side pushing for the existing plan to be implemented, a Japanese official said.
Hatoyama's two-month-old government has agitated Washington by announcing a review of a 2006 pact under which the airbase would be moved to a less heavily populated coastal area of Okinawa.
Hatoyama has left open the possibility of the Futenma Air Base being removed from Okinawa Island - and even the country - to lighten the burden on the area, which hosts more than half of the 47,000 US troops based in Japan.
Under the 2006 agreement, 8,000 US Marines would be transferred from Okinawa to Guam.
The two sides reconfirmed their shared wish to resolve the issue quickly, Japan's Defence Minister Toshimi Kitazawa said after the talks.
"We will offer fresh ideas in order for the working group to reach a certain level of achievement," he said.
US President Barack Obama urged Tokyo to "expeditiously" settle the issue during his visit last week, saying Japan's post-war economic miracle was due in part to the security guarantee provided by the US military.
- AFP/yb
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