Kurt Campbell
Satoshi Ogawa / Yomiuri Shimbun Correspondent
WASHINGTON--Kurt Campbell, U.S. assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs, has canceled a planned visit Wednesday to Tokyo for discussions with senior Foreign Ministry officials, a U.S. official said Monday.
Speaking at a news conference, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs Philip Crowley attributed the abrupt cancellation to a change in Campbell's itinerary for his tour of Southeast Asian countries that has been cut short due to political unrest in Thailand.
Campbell left Washington for a 10-day tour of Singapore, Malaysia, Laos, Brunei, Indonesia and Thailand, that was to be capped by a stop in Tokyo on Wednesday as he headed back to Washington via Narita Airport.
He was scheduled to be in Japan for about seven or eight hours, during which he was to meet with high-ranking Foreign Ministry officials to discuss pending bilateral issues, including the relocation of the U.S. Marine Corps' Futenma Air Station in Ginowan, Okinawa Prefecture.
But the stop in Thailand scheduled for Monday and Tuesday was canceled due to the country's unstable political situation caused by antigovernment protests.
With the change to the itinerary, Campbell went back to Singapore on Monday and was to leave for Washington on Tuesday via Narita Airport.
Crowley said it had become impossible to secure sufficient transit time for discussions with officials in Tokyo.
But when a U.S. civil airplane is used for a flight from Singapore to Washington via Narita, the transit time is usually about one hour, observers said.
A U.S. government official did not give a clear answer why his return to Washington was advanced by one day while skipping his scheduled meeting in Tokyo.
With the meeting set for Wednesday, it would have been possible to arrange a Tuesday night stay in Tokyo and have the meeting as scheduled before heading to Washington, the observers said.
Futenma was expected to be a major topic at the meeting.
The observers said Campbell canceled the visit to Japan probably because he did not expect any progress would be made over the Futenma issue even if he met with Japanese officials, and a meeting at this juncture might further complicate the issue.
The Japanese government has yet to decide on a new relocation site to replace the offshore site near Camp Schwab in the Henoko district of Nago, Okinawa Prefecture that was agreed on between the two countries in 2006.
Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama told reporters Tuesday morning that Campbell's cancellation of his visit was "not a matter we can be involved in."
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Okada, Clinton might meet
Tokyo and Washington are making arrangements for Foreign Minister Katsu-ya Okada and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to hold a meeting later this month.
The two governments are considering having the meeting in Washington on the weekend before the Group of Eight foreign ministerial meeting set for March 29-30 in Canada.
(Mar. 17, 2010)
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