Lawless says U.S. will not agree to realignment revisions

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Lawless says U.S. will not agree to realignment revisions
By David Allen, Stars and Stripes
Pacific edition, Thursday, February 12, 2009

CAMP FOSTER, Okinawa — The man who worked with his Japanese counterparts to hammer out an agreement to realign U.S. troops in Japan says any change in the agreement could result in scrapping the move of some 8,000 Marines from Okinawa to Guam.

In an interview with Japan’s NHK television, Richard Lawless, former deputy undersecretary of defense for Asian and Pacific affairs, said the U.S. will not agree to revise the bilateral realignment agreement signed in May 2006.

He focused on objections by Okinawa officials to the plan to replace Marine Corps Air Station Futenma, in the middle of an urban area, with an airport on Camp Schwab in rural northeast Okinawa.

The plan calls for two V-shaped runways to be built on the Henoko Peninsula and extending on landfill in Oura Bay. The Okinawans want the runways to be constructed farther offshore. Their resistance to the design has stalled the project.

"The specific location was something that was discussed for two years," Lawless told NHK Monday in Washington, D.C. "It was based on a lot of compromises that were made within the U.S. government. It was the one that was offered by the Japanese government that we accepted."


Rest of article at: http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=60633