TRAVEL

Two U.S. Marines were arrested Sunday in Okinawa, one on suspicion of drunken driving and another for allegedly obstructing official police duties, police officials said. Both lance corporals at the U.S. Marines' Makiminato Service Area in Urasoe denied the allegations, they said. Jamel Gary, 23, is suspected of drunken driving in Naha shortly before 1 a.m. Sunday, while Christopher Brooks, 24, in the front passenger seat of the vehicle, allegedly obstructed a police officer's attempt to conduct an alcohol test on Gary by throwing himself at the officer, according to them. (AP)

An investigation by the Ministry of Finance has confirmed that the Japanese government deposited $103 million into a zero-interest account at the U.S. Federal Reserve Bank of New York between 1972, when Okinawa was formally returned to Japan, and 1999. Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Naoto Kan has also admitted that there was a secret pact between Japan and the U.S. over the reversion of Okinawa. At the same time, it has been learned that no documents relating to the deposit were retained on Japan's side, and officials at the Ministry of Finance did not hand down information to their successors. (Mainichi)

On a humid March evening in Okinawa young American men with crewcuts and thick necks sprawl out from the bars and lap-dancing clubs that cluster near US military bases across the island. "Marijuana - it's like alcohol, but . . ." reads one T-shirt. A young white man weaves his Honda Saloon at speed through cars heading for a junction. "We all pull clear," one Japanese driver says. "There are so many accidents." The US has slapped tough rules on the 22,000 Marines and 24,000 other personnel on its vast bases on Okinawa, the southernmost island of Japan, after the rape of a 12-year-old girl by three servicemen in 1995 brought tens of thousands of people on to the streets in protest. (Times Online)

Signs of the full-blown spring season were observed in Japan when cherry blossoms bloomed Wednesday in the western city of Kochi, coming out the earliest in any location other than Okinawa and nearby southern islands, the Japan Meteorological Agency said. The "someiyoshino" cherry blossoms in Kochi came out six days earlier than the previous year and tied the record for the earliest blooming on Japan's main islands, which was registered three times in the past -- in Kagoshima Prefecture in 1955 and 1973 and in Wakayama Prefecture in 1959. (AP)

The government has confirmed the existence in a U.S. bank of an interest-free savings account that is linked to an alleged secret Japan-U.S. agreement on the financial cost of the 1972 reversion of Okinawa to Japan, Finance Minister Naoto Kan said Friday. According to government sources, the U.S. bank was the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. However, it remains unclear whether the government in power at the time, instead of earning interest on the deposit, might instead have used it to provide the United States with de facto funding for the reversion costs. (Yomiuri)

An earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 6.9 jolted Okinawa Prefecture early Saturday morning, causing tidal waves of up to 10 centimeters, the Japan Meteorological Agency said. Two people sustained minor injuries while ruptured water pipes were reported in Naha, the capital of Okinawa, and elsewhere, local authorities said. The quake logged lower 5 on the Japanese seismic intensity scale of 7 in the city of Itoman on the southern tip of Okinawa's main island. (AP)

Dominican pitcher Maximo Nelson, once on the books of the New York Yankees, has been arrested by Japanese police after a live bullet was found in his bag at an airport in Okinawa. Nelson, who had been in the southern prefecture for spring training with the Chunichi Dragons, was taken into in custody on Friday on suspicion of breaching the Asian country's laws on gun and sword control, the Kyodo news agency reported. (Reuters)

Described by many as the worst crisis in decades in Japan-US relations, the controversy surrounding the relocation of the US Futenma air base in Okinawa has left Japan's Prime Minister with the choice of defying its most important ally or breaking a key election pledge. But as David McNeill reports, whatever the outcome, the debate has reinforced Okinawans' disillusionment with power politics and government promises. (The Diplomat)

Nestle has given one of the most popular and long-established chocolate bars in the world a uniquely Japanese make-over. Kit Kat bars are now available in 19 new flavours that reflect specialities from regions across Japan, ranging from sweet potatoes from Okinawa to melons from Hokkaido, strawberries from Tochigi, green tea from Kyoto and soy sauce from Tokyo. (independent.co.uk)

To mark the 50th anniversary this year of the signing of the Japan-U.S. Security Treaty, the two governments have declared their intention to 'deepen' the alliance. They aim to create a new vision for the alliance by November, when U.S. President Barack Obama plans to visit Japan. But Japan-U.S. relations are experiencing a rocky patch, mainly due to Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama's decision to re-examine from scratch a 2006 agreement on the relocation of the U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma in Okinawa Prefecture. In the United States, an increasingly critical perception has taken hold over what the Hatoyama administration is trying to achieve. (East Asia Forum)

Human bone fragments, among the oldest so far discovered in Japan, have been recovered from a cave on Ishigaki Island in Okinawa Prefecture, the prefectural government's education bureau said Thursday. Scientific checks have showed that the bone fragments are between 15,000 and 20,000 years old, which means they date back to the country's Paleolithic Period. Ishigaki, a popular tourist destination, is located about 400 kilometers southwest of Okinawa's prefectural capital of Naha. (AP)

The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism has decided to start waiving tolls on regional expressways in June as part of its pilot project to promote free highways, it has emerged. The project will cover about 35 sections -- mainly two-lane sections -- on regional expressways, with the total road length to be around 1,500 kilometers, or one-fifth of the nation's entire expressway length. Highways designated to become toll free are parts of the Hokkaido Odan Expressway, the Nihonkai-Tohoku Expressway, the Sanin Expressway, the Higashi-Kyushu Expressway and the Okinawa Expressway, among other routes. (Mainichi)

We were halfway to Coconut Moon, a beach bar owned by Kiyomasa Higa, Japan's godfather of rock, when the taxi radio crackled into action. Coconut Moon was shut, having conceded defeat to Typhoon Lupit. The locals had been praying for rain and they'd got it. Lupit, the first typhoon of the year, arrived in Okinawa about two hours after we did. But while typhoons have scant regard for tourists, our driver had it sussed. "You want awamori [a rice-based spirit]? Dancing?" After three days of lashing rain and cancelled flights and ferries our bedraggled crowd was up for anything. And that's how we ended up in Nakayuki (Little Break), an inconspicuous bar in the village of Onna, taking turns on a traditional three-stringed guitar, eating dragon fruit, necking guava juice laced with awamori and "pushing the happiness" until 3am. Sharing the love with locals has never been so much fun. (guardian.co.uk)

Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada said Friday that Japan will pursue "active" and "dynamic" diplomacy with the arrival of what he calls a new era of international cooperation while enhancing ties with Asia- Pacific countries and taking the lead on global issues such as nuclear disarmament. On relations with the United States, which have been strained due to a row over a U.S. base in Okinawa, Okada said in a foreign policy address to parliament that the bilateral alliance remains the linchpin of Japan's foreign policy and vowed to promote understanding among the people of the importance of stationing U.S. forces in Japan as a deterrent. (AP)

of Japan Secretary General Ichiro Ozawa said Wednesday, in speaking of recent changes of government in some countries, that the United States had gone "as far as" electing a black man. "In the United States, the people made a choice to change society and change the nation by going as far as selecting a black man whose name is Mr. (Barack) Obama," he told a meeting in Naha, the Okinawa capital. (AP)

There are no signs of the U.S.-Japan conflict around moving the U.S. armed forces base in Futenma, Okinawa, ending this year, either. The problem instead appears to be growing more complex. The two countries have been trying to move the Futenma air base to another location in Okinawa according to the United States Armed Forces in Japan reorganization plan agreed upon in 2006. Now that Japan is suddenly standing up to the United States, the U.S. must be in shock. Something that would have been unimaginable during the five decades of Liberal Democratic Party rule is now happening. (JoongAng Ilbo)

A U.S. soldier charged with negligent driving resulting in death over a fatal accident last year in Yomitan, Okinawa Prefecture, was indicted Wednesday on an additional charge of hit-and-run. Prosecutors took the step of a supplementary indictment against Clyde Gunn, a 27-year-old staff sergeant at the Torii Communication Station, as they initially indicted him with only material evidence. He had been refusing to be questioned unless the process was audio-visually recorded. (AP)

Susumu Inamine, who has been opposed to accepting the U.S. Marine Corps' Futemma Air Station, won the mayoral race Sunday in Nago, Okinawa Prefecture, making it difficult for Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama to implement a 2006 Japan-U.S. accord to relocate the facility to Nago. Hatoyama has said he wants to see the election result before making any decision on the U.S. base issue and vowed to conclude negotiations with the United States by the end of May, but prospects are dim that he can find a feasible alternative site. (AP)

In the run-up to the 50th anniversary of the security alliance between Tokyo and Washington last week, the conventional wisdom was that the U.S.-Japan relationship was in a downward spiral. Since taking power in September, Japan's Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama has insisted on revising a 2006 military realignment agreement that would relocate a controversial Marine air base on Okinawa known as Futenma from a densely populated residential area to an offshore site of another base on the island. (NewsWeek)

Ginowan is only a small city, of 92,000 people; even so, imagine how New Yorkers living around Central Park would feel, were it an air base bristling with marines belonging to a country that once colonised them. That gives a sense of why Futenma, however much it has helped keep the peace in East Asia, has long needed to move. That much America and Japan agree upon. Negotiations to find a replacement have dragged on since 1996, the year after three American marines gang-raped a 12-year-old Okinawan girl. But since the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) took power last September, the issue has opened an unusually deep wound in relations between the two countries. (The Economist)

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Tuesday the United States wants Japan to fulfill its promise over the relocation of a U.S. military base in Japan's Okinawa Prefecture in line with the bilateral accord in 2006. Clinton reiterated Washington's position on the base issue at a joint news conference with Japanese Foreign Minister Katsuya Okada following their meeting in Honolulu, Hawaii. (AP)

U.S. President Barack Obama's top diplomat for East Asia urged Japan on Thursday to make clear that it values continuing security ties with the United States as the two allies spar over the relocation of a U.S. Marine Corps airfield. The United States and Japan agreed in 2006 to move the base to a less crowded part of Okinawa. (Japan Times)

Japanese police have decided to arrest a U.S. soldier on a hit-and-run charge as early as Friday afternoon following his indictment on the technical charge of vehicular manslaughter over a fatal accident last year in Yomitan, Okinawa Prefecture. Clyde Gunn, a 27-year-old staff sergeant at the Torii Communication Station, allegedly hit and killed Masakazu Hokama, 66, while driving a car on Nov. 7, 2009. (AP)

At the beginning of this new year, I turned my thoughts to the qualifications needed to be prime minister. My musings took me back nearly 40 years to the day when a tear unexpectedly rolled down the cheek of then Prime Minister Eisaku Sato. Shortly afterward, he said in his deep voice: "I think I'm doing something good for the people of Okinawa Prefecture. But am I actually doing a bad thing?" It was November 1971, and listening silently to Sato in his executive office at the Prime Minister's Office that day was Sadanori Yamanaka, then director general of the Management and Coordination Agency. The only other person in the room, Yamanaka was in charge of Okinawa's reversion from the United States to Japanese sovereignty. (Yomiuri)

Police turned over to prosecutors Monday their case against a U.S. Army staff sergeant who was allegedly involved in a fatal hit-and-run in Yomitan, Okinawa. The case against 27-year-old Clyde Gunn alleges negligence while driving resulting in death, the prefectural police said. (Japan Times)